Prime Minister calls accusations against Konrad Mizzi “hogwash”

An embattled Prime Minister went to the Labour Party club in Had-Dingli this morning and was greeted by a small throng of diehard supporters shouting “Joseph!”. He was accompanied by two security guards and no other prominent members of the government or the party hierarchy.

Watch the video here. Asked by a journalist from The Sunday Times what he has to say about the news story on The Malta Independent’s front page this morning – that Konrad Mizzi transferred his Panama company to a New Zealand trust the very same day Gasol sold its shares in Electrogas Malta to the Maltese shareholders, the Prime Minister gave his reply in just one word: “Hogwash.” He then turned his back on the journalist and kept going.

Muscat’s facial expression and body language were, this morning, what they have been over the last couple of weeks since it became clear that the Panamagate scandal will not go away: a mixture of anxiety, unease, uncertainty, humiliation and awkwardness. His standard ebullient cockiness and smirking arrogance are marked by their absence.