My favourite bit:

“Many of the super-rich Chinese have gained in a system where there is a strong link between politics, business and corruption. It’s difficult to tell you exactly how many Chinese billionaires there are because they do not want to be found. Chinese billionaires must have political connections to keep their wealth safe, become politicians themselves or acquire foreign citizenships. ”

This is the sort of client Joseph Muscat is after with his Individual Investor Programme.

It started with someone asking, “How much did the election campaign cost the Labour Party and where did the funds come from?” The sum was obviously very high. but no answer was ever given, providing grounds for speculation.

Soon after the election it was revealed that anyone could buy a Maltese passport for 650,000 Euro. Am I the only one who wondered how that figure was arrived at?

It seemed rather a strange number to me. I would have expected a round number in the millions; even Eur750,000 would not have seemed so unusual.

The budget then threw up the figure of Eur15 million as the sum to be generated by the Sale-of-Passports scheme. My mathematical mind worked out that if each passport cost Eur650,000, 23 main applicants were required to raise the sum of Eur15 million.

At this point my suspicious mind took over. What if 23 individuals who needed an alternative passport approached the Labour Party (or maybe the other way round) and offered (or were asked) to contribute a million each with the promise that a passport would be issued when the party was, as expected, elected to government?

That would leave a cool Eur8 million (23 million minus 15 million) for the election campaign and other party expenses.

That would answer the question raised at the beginning of this speculation as well as explain why nothing was said about the passports scheme BEFORE the election and the speed with which the scheme was rushed through AFTER the election.

Well, I’ll get my hat and coat and report myself immediately to a psychiatrist.

Once there, it should not be a problem to compare the previous and post electoral register lists and identify the ‘new’ ones after excluding the 18 year old etc. Maybe I’m missing something?

[Daphne – You’re missing a lot. Voting rights are not automatic on the acquisition of citizenship. If that were the case, the many thousands of Australian and Canadian citizens who also hold Maltese passports would be on the electoral roll in Malta. But they are not. That’s because they live in Australia and Canada and not in Malta. Almost none of those who buy Maltese passports will be living in Malta. Their interest is in buying it and moving into somewhere more enticing in the European Union, like Paris or London, or staying where they are, but protected as an EU citizen. In any case, even if you do find a different name on the electoral register, you have no way of knowing whether the person was naturalised by regular means or whether he bought his passport. And children under the age of 18 don’t go onto an electoral roll anyway.]

’10th July 2013 – Women, men and children seeking refuge in Malta were yesterday at risk of being pushed back to Libya or to be kept in detention. In just a few hours the pressure and mobilization in Malta, Brussels and Geneva halted any unlawful rapid push-back operation initially discussed by the Maltese government. At […]’

http://www.terredeshommes.org/where-we-work/europe/malta/

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa/2013/11/gun-battles-erupt-libyan-capital-2013117225536671938.html

Charming, just charming.

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20131107/local/no-cap-on-the-number-who-can-buy-citizenship-henley.493749

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat will have more than half a million euros coming in from sales of Maltese passports per business day he spends in Castille – assuming the full price per passport. Qabel ir-radda tas-salib, kif nghidu bil-Malti.

This adds up to 1,000 passports in 4 years, and 1,250 in 5 years.

Annual gross value of those passports is euro 163 million.

Henley & Partners will make euro 7 million in commissions and euro 18 million in client fees – a total of euro 25 million per annum.

Over 5 years, the gross value amounts to euro 812 million, and Henley & Partners make euro 120 million.

Over 7 years, the gross value is euro 1.132 million.

When Lawrence Gonzi negotiated euro 1.128 billion of funds from the EU budget for the 7 years from 2014 to 2020, Joseph Muscat’s reaction was “Been there, done that.”

Now I understand what he meant.

But there is an important difference: Lawrence Gonzi did not prostitute Malta and the identity of the Maltese for money.

Henley is on record today forecasting sale of 200-300 passports. That makes Euro 150.000.000 revenue to Manuel Mallia’s IIP scheme.

So, is Manuel Mallia retaining direct control over the Euro 135,000,000 balance, after handing over the budgeted 15,000,000 to the consolidated fund? And all under the cover of absolute secrecy assured by the IIP Act?

The IIP has been compared to prostitution of Maltese citizenship by the Joseph Muscat government. That analogy can now be extended to pimping of the worst order at the expense of the Maltese people.

All secrecy regarding the IIP must be put aside. The people are entitled to an immediate, full, and clear explanation of what is going on.

Mintoff allied Malta with the worst possible dictators known to the world back then, and eventually, sold Malta’s soul backed by his fanatics who remain a curse and an affliction on this doomed rock.

Mintoff was a sociopath and so is Muscat. Both lack/ed feeling or any ability to empathise with those around them. Both are/were driven by money and self-aggrandizement.

It’s out of this world to listen to PN MPs bringing forth the argument that Mintoff wouldn’t agree with the cheap sale of passports. They should know better. It is exactly the kind of thing Mintoff would have done.

A man who sold Malta to Gaddafi in exchange for financial help when he screwed up over the closure of the British military base would sell his mother for a song and to hell with passports.