Opposition leader calls on those who may yet be named in Swiss Leaks to come clean now

Published: February 21, 2015 at 5:00pm

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Busuttil 2

It’s a good statement.

Those who had accounts at HSBC Geneva before 2007 know for a fact that their names are in there somewhere. The Swiss Leaks data are, apparently, exhaustive. The only ones who have full access to entire database so far are the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (which has published no Maltese name other than Tancred Tabone’s), its partner organisations The Guardian, BBC Panorama and Le Monde, and the French government.

Even if the names are not released now or any time soon (they may not be released at all), the fact that these individuals are no longer protected by banking secrecy is like a guillotine suspended over their heads.

Of course, here I refer only to any present or former public officers and politicians, and to those indicted in the ongoing oil-trading-corruption prosecutions. There isn’t a public-interest case that can be made for revealing information about anybody else. It’s between them and the tax authorities, and nobody else.

The fact that two of the men indicted in the ‘oil scandal’ had accounts at HSBC Geneva – Tancred Tabone and Frank Sammut – is quite a strong indication that others involved in the same network may have had accounts there too.

Frank Sammut’s name was not released by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists or by any of its partner organisations in the Swiss Leaks reportage. But two years ago Malta Today had published a story in which it referred to documents in its possession which show that Energy & Environment Consultants Ltd, which is registered in Gibraltar and owned by Frank Sammut, had an account at HSBC Geneva into which “commissions” (corruption payments) were made by oil company Trafigura.

This means that Energy & Environment Consultants Ltd (and therefore Frank Sammut) are definitely in the as yet unpublished Swiss Leaks data. The likelihood is that others who are currently undergoing investigation by the police, and prosecution, for involvement in the same network, have or had at the time an account at HSBC Geneva too.