At the mention of Ronnie Agius, are the Labour members of the Public Accounts Committee going to back off?
The Law Commissioner: special counsel to a man whose “trusted friend” is somebody investigated for cigarette-smuggling, arms-running and IRA links by the police forces of several EU member states.
I rather suspect so. I wondered why George Farrugia dropped him into the mix at least twice at the hearing yesterday, saying that he was the first person he rang and spoke to when the trouble first broke, after trying to ring his wife and his lawyer and not getting through, and then later in the hearing mentioning him again and describing him as his “trusted friend”.
I thought yesterday that was a bad move, a crazy move. Why introduce into an already very troubled equation, and describe him as somebody close who you trust, a notorious man who has been investigated internationally for cigarette smuggling, arms running and links with the IRA?
Now I realise it was probably a calculated move, because Agius was very much involved with the Labour government of the Golden Years, in with Lorry Sant and Mintoff, and probably knows a hell of a lot about very many people. To have survived so far with police in Rotterdam, Italy, Northern Ireland and Malta on his tail at various points, he must be quite the operator.
If the government MPs back off from questioning Farrugia about his links to Ronnie Agius – it strikes me that the name was sounded as a warning – the Opposition MPs should not.
My antennae tell me that this is where the real story, the real news, the real scandal, lies.
Franco Debono’s lunch with Malta Today 50% owner Saviour Balzan yesterday seems to have paid off for him. Debono, besides being the Law Commissioner, is defence counsel and adviser to George Farrugia. Though practically all the information on Ronnie Agius’s cigarette-smuggling, arms-running and IRA links and pursuit by the Northern Irish, Rotterdam, Belgian and Italian police comes from Malta Today’s investigative reports back in 2001 – the newspaper this morning has chosen not to tell its readers exactly who this Ronnie Agius is, and merely reports his name factually as mentioned in the PAC hearings without an explanation.
I found this fascinating. Malta Today can’t claim ignorance of Ronnie Agius, because it was the only newspaper that investigated him 13 years ago when the Northern Irish police had arrived in Malta for an anti-smuggling operation in cooperation with the Maltese police.
Also, George Farrugia is Malta Today’s target – on the face of it – and it was that newspaper which broke the story on him last January and pursued it. So you would think it would have had a field-day last night and this morning at Farrugia’s description of this man as his “trusted friend”, with major headlines about cigarette-smuggling, the IRA, imprisonment in Rotterdam, extradition to Italy, and shady goings-on generally.
It’s a massive story, it fits with Malta Today’s anti-George Farrugia agenda, and the newspaper has much of the information on Agius already. But…silence.
Mention of Ronnie Agius must have either given Malta Today a conflict with its agenda, or its real target is/was not George Farrugia, or both of those things.
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Excellent, Daphne.
George Farrugia’s behaviour reminded me of John Dalli when he said that he rang and phoned his trusted friend, before anyone else, when trouble first broke.
Ronnie Agius: In the early 70s did this guy have a photography shop in Paola Square?
[Daphne – I think so, yes.]
No, that was his father’s.
Ronnie had a photography shop in Pieta, next to the Sa Maison Hotel.
And had another photography shop in Qormi.
No that was owned by the late Mario Agius.
Ronnie Agius owned the Konica Photo Laboratory in Pieta. He was considered as one of the blue-eyed boys of the MLP during those ‘glorious days’.
I honestly need to recover from shock while I read this news about these cobwebs. My God…
Malta Today has lost all credibility as an independent newspaper. For all Saviour Balzan’s posturing, it is just another tool for the Labour government.
It is a tool for John Dalli first, and the Labour Party second.
Malta Today and its (Balzan’s) strange, altered allegiances over the years, can’t fail to tie them up in all kinds of knots just like this one. It’s happened before and will happen again.
Why doesn’t he just ‘say it like it is’.
Getting closer to the real deal, are we, Saviour?
One wonders who had this Ronnie Agius under their wings in Libya. Some charitable institution no doubt.
Cigarette smuggling and Libya, green soap and horse dung.
Talk about smelling a rat in these proceeding…
Having known Ronnie Agius since our school days may I add that he’s also a kind and helpful person. ‘Ghandu punti hziena u punti tajbin’ as Eddie Fenech Adami once said about someone else.
Labour members’ reaction (or lack of it) on the PAC can be very telling.
Remember how a few weeks ago, Dr Godwin Debono was called as witness by the PAC, but was exonerated after only 13 minutes of questioning.
Dr Debono was Head of oil exploration when Joe Mizzi decided to drill a well in Gozo (Madonna taz-Zejt well) in 1998.
The method of funding broke away from the traditional public sharing contract that placed all risk on the foreign oil company. Instead the risk and cost was shifted on Malta, thanks to Joe Mizzi (that’s a real scandal in itself). The well ended up a bottomless pit that siphoned off 32 million euro of public funds!
No wonder Dr Debono was exonerated so quickly. They did not want him to reveal the truth about the Madonna taz-Zejt well scandal.
Excellent! What would we do without you?
The plot thickens.