Finance Minister lets slip that “there is no cooperation from the authorities in Panama”

Speaking yesterday in response to a 31-page report by the Party of European Greens (the representative grouping of Green parties in the European Parliament) on what it describes as Malta’s “tax haven” status, the Finance Minister let slip that Malta’s “tax authorities have started 33 investigations into companies linked to the Panama Papers despite there being no cooperation from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists or even the Panamanian authorities themselves.”

This is a fascinating slip. If Konrad Mizzi and the Prime Minister are to be believed, then Mizzi’s Hearnville Inc is one of those 33 companies, and it therefore follows that it is also one of the companies on which the Panamanian authorities and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists are not cooperating with the Maltese tax authorities.

So much for the audit that is designed to clear Mizzi’s name: an audit performed with – by the Finance Minister’s own admission – no cooperation or information from Panama.

And now for another question, which the newspapers should have been asking from the outset. Why has the Prime Minister not promised an audit also of his chief of staff’s offshore operations? Why just Konrad Mizzi?

In the light of the Finance Minister’s giving the game away, yesterday, the question can be even more specific. Is Keith Schembri’s Tillgate Inc, registered in Panama, one of the 33 Panama Papers companies under investigation by the Maltese tax authorities?

And if not, why?

Why is the press not asking why it’s only Konrad Mizzi’s Hearnville Inc which is being “audited”, and not also Keith Schembri’s Tillgate Inc?