Was that actually a contract yesterday, or yet another memorandum of understanding?
We need to frame yesterday’s Big Government News in the context of its positioning on the Labour Party’s news bulletin list. You’d expect One News to go to town with it, like they do when there’s a story with my name in it. After all, here it is ‘et lest’, the big China contract we’ve all been waiting for. But One News had it way down on the list: number five or six. Don’t overlook that – it’s not a detail but significant information.
In a contract, dates and terms are highly specific. Yet the Energy Minister said that Shanghia Electric “should” (the hypothetical form of the verb rather than the definite form) pay Enemalta the first tranche of money “by the end of the year”. That leaves two weeks. That means it is a payment on signature, so it is either is or it isn’t and there is no “should” about it.
Secondly, we are expected to believe that the Chinese entered into this contract which obliges them to pay all that money, convert the BWSC power station to gas, and this without a guaranteed market because apparently the contract does not oblige Enemalta to buy any power from them at all. Shanghai Electric will shell out hundreds of millions, convert the power station, and then Enemalta can turn round and say: “Thanks, but no thanks. We’re buying our power elsewhere.”
Right.
Many of the problems holding up the contract, he said, were technical and had to do with Electrogas and the kind of gas they’re supplying. I see. We hadn’t understood this clearly before. So now Electrogas are not only supplying gas to their own brand-new power station of which there is as yet no sign at all, but they will also be supplying gas to Shanghai Electric’s power station too once it is converted.
It is becoming increasingly obvious, I suspect even to Electrogas themselves, there there is no room in this equation for their projected power station at all. It looks like they’re going to be quietly forced out by the Chinese and cut loose by the Malta government, because China has more leverage on Joseph Muscat and Konrad Mizzi than the collective clout of the Gasan Group, the Apap Bologna siblings and the Tumas Group do. Chinese money talks a whole lot louder.
The press asked the energy minister whether his wife was involved in the negotiations. What a joke – she knows as much about power stations and industrial operations at that level as her husband does (hence the ongoing fiasco). She’s there to fix visas for North Koreans and other weirdos, and the most we can hope is that she’s not topping up her official income fenonemali with a few Chinese-style sweeteners on the side.
It was also reported that Enemalta’s board of directors is to be reconstituted. That figures. I doubt that Shanghai Electric would wish to keep on the professionally competent expert in power production and industry, Loopy Lara Boffa. Because of course everybody has forgotten already that Miss Boffa hasn’t only been put on the public payroll at the Malta Council for Science and Technology by her boyfriend (an act of corruption) but she is also a director of the board at Enemalta at a time when Enemalta most needs truly competent and professional directors.
But then again, I don’t know how these things work in China. Maybe they also think it’s normal to have a chairman’s mistress (or is he a politician now, given that the Labour Party considers him to be its representative?) on the board of directors of a state corporation just because she’s a chairman’s mistress?
It sounds very Chairman Mao era.
Was the contract actually published, or did the press simply receive a Department of Information press statement with details approved (or written) by the Office of the Prime Minister?
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It was a contract binding both parties not to disclose anything of the actual details of the agreement to third parties.
This includes also parliament.
Transparency, their ass.
If we are to know any details, it has to be from China. So watch out.
What baffled me most was that on One News yesterday, the signing of the “contract” was the sixth or seventh item on the news.
On One News 2 ( aka TVM) it was the first item of the day’s news.
Why? Any ideas? Something’s fishy.
Silvio Scerri called to add the words ‘fl-ajru’ after the word ‘kuntratt’.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/05/19/ozy-china-taking-over-africa/9277413/
Kon-rat Mizzi ffirma – mela l-poplu Malti ghandu jkun infurmat x’qed jigri.
I believe they are in a rush to get this deal signed sealed and delivered because the Chinese know very well that Joseph Muscat’s reign is on the verge of collapse and the PN will not go ahead with it.
Joseph Muscat too wants it done because of the pre-election deal behind the deal. The sooner he is removed the better for all.
I sincerely hope that the PN media have some solid proof to nail him on the Malliagate saga.
Naqbel mieghek. U jekk jiccumbaw x’kien hemm jinhema wara Malliagate nistghu nghidu li sa Marzu gheluq is-sentejn nittamaw f’Alla nkunu hlisna minn dawn l-inkompetenti. Nistennew u naraw. Inkella msieken ahna.
As much as the house of cards will come falling down, they are still going to cling to power for as long as they can.
Maybe Joseph took a hard decision and put his foot down with China, forcing them to do as he wants – you know, like he did with Manuel Mallia.
I do not think that Chinese politicians suffer Maltese fools gladly. The Chinese have got Muscat by his balls.
Since no details are forthcoming, the two may have simply been drawing matchstick people on two blank papers for all we know.
What is crystal clear is that Labour has absolutely no direction and never had any idea of governance.
On further examination of the Enemalta/Shanghai Electric so called “investment agreement” it assumes that China will subscribe to 33.3% of shares in both the new Enemalta SPV and to 90% of shares in the BWSC (now called D3).
The agreement does not contain any date by which the Chinese have to actually do this. The same with the conversion of D3 to gas, there is no time line as far as I can see.
As for dispatch rights, again all that is said is that there will some sort of committee to decide this from day to day.
Did I miss any mention on the future of Enemalta’s employees?
This is scary, because this loosely drawn agreement (it is really just a further memorandum of understanding) is signed by parties who are consummate proven liars with no respect for the whole truth nor for the ordinary citizen.
http://maltarightnow.com/news/2014/12/13/dokumenti-importanti-dwar-il-ftehim-ma-shangai-electric-power-ghadhom-ma-gewx-publikati/
‘Secondly, we are expected to believe that the Chinese entered into this contract which obliges them to pay all that money, convert the BWSC power station to gas, and this without a guaranteed market because apparently the contract does not oblige Enemalta to buy any power from them at all.’
Not exactly.
Konrat said that a specially set up board will purchase power at the best price from all sources including Shanghai Electric.
Naturally this board is responsible to and controlled by the government which in turn is controlled by the Chinese government which will eventually decide from where the board will be ordered to purchase its power.
This government is too crude to be subtle.
It appears that Electrogas will now only be providing the gas in return for relinquishing its contract to build a power station.
The saga continues.
The Labour Movement continues to intensify the campaign of diversion tactics in order to re-attach to the Sliema switchers. But I still think this will be an unsuccessful attempt
Once trust is lost, it is difficult to recover it, even if the prime minister publishes 100 enquiry reports, signs 1,000 contracts with China, proposes a million monorail projects and illudes with a billion bridges between Malta and Gozo.
What I find strange in the agreement is that as far as had already been established, the contract with Electrogas had not been signed. So even though the Minister said that Shanghai Electric will be converting the BWSC to gas, who is going to deliver the gas?
Perhaps this explains why Shell has come into the fray. I have the feeling that the two projects (BWSC and Electrogas) have now been separated in terms of gas intake, and this suggests that Daphne’s theory that the Electrogas project will not go ahead is correct. BWSC’s gas intake will most probably be autonomous from common infrastructure.
The government will be able to say that it has converted the (BWSC) powerstation to gas and that electricity is generated from gas.
Meanwhile, the prime minister will say that he has delivered all the energy plan promised by Labour, because what he promised was that there will be investors willing to invest in the project.
This is how he has wiggled his way out of his promise that he will resign if Labour’s plan is not implemented within two years. So now he will say that there were indeed 19 investors who showed interest in the new gas powerstation, and one of them was even chosen as a preferred bidder.
But it’s not his fault if the project did not go ahead, because he never promised anything beyond the interest by investors. He will also say that there was also China which showed interest as an investor in Labour’s plans.
And if it was a Department of Information press statement should we believe it.
It is a given that the Chinese will downsize Enemalta’s employees. They are gradually preparing them. It is a matter of time before the guillotine falls.
Yesterday Konrad Mizzi was having dinner with the delegation at the Thai Restaurant. There were also some big shots like Charles Mangion and wife.
Kon-rat said that this is an investment for the Shanghai company. So where do the interests of Malta come in?