All four PN leadership candidates were summoned and have appeared before the PN's ethics committee, referred to as the Consultative Committee on Correct and Ethical behaviour, which is being chaired by former Minister Louis Galea, The Malta Independent can confirm.
The committee was set up on Monday after an urgent PN administrative council meeting which discussed the allegations on Delia. The latter has denied any illegality or earnings made from a prostitution racket based in London. The PN leadership hopeful has so far filed five libels to rebut the claims. The committee had two days from when it was set up to make its recommendations to the Administrative Council after speaking the persons it feels necessary
PN leadership contender Chris Said met with the committee yesterday afternoon, he said. He would not divulge what he was asked about, stating it is confidential. "They asked us to keep it confidential," he said.
Asked whether the committee requested him to personally hand them a copy of his declaration of assets and financial interests, he reiterated that he has already published his declaration of assets and financial interests.
PN leadership contender Alex Perici Calascione appeared before the party ethics committee on Tuesday, he confirmed.
Replying to questions by this newspaper following a press conference this morning, the former PN treasurer said that he immediately accepted to appear before this committee but would not divulge what was said during this meeting.
"It would not be right for me to comment or make public what was said during this sitting," he said. Perici Calascione also said that he would not comment on the latest developments in the leadership race and would be doing so "with respect to Adrian Delia", the PN contender who is battling very serious allegations by blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia.
PN leadership candidate Frank Portelli, when asked whether he was summoned before the committee, asked why this question wasn't posed to the ethics committee, but then said that all four candidates went before it.
Asked what they asked him about, he said that what he can say, is that "they were 100% satisfied that the allegations against me were malicious, intended to harm me and my family, and the courts will confirm this." He said that there will be criminal charges from his part against Daphne Caruana Galizia.
Asked whether he has filed his declaration of assets, he said that he has already declared them. "I have no hidden assets. My assets are St Philips and the house I live in. I had made a public declaration. My involvement with St Philips is well known. A malicious journalist says I have debt. I found it there and I paid Lm1 million of it," he said.
"When I joined there was Lm4 million debt, and I paid Lm1 million. I did not create the debt, (these are) lies. The hospital had borrowed the money before I joined, and that is why it is malicious. She has psychological problems… and she will go into the dustbin of history."
Contender Adrian Delia met with the committee yesterday. "They called me in to clarify a number of issues that were mentioned in recent media publications. I gave my clarifications and explanations about what was said, showing they were all machinations and creations of fantasy and spin. I took a substantial dossier of documents which are relative to a client file on one particular story which kept on spinning, in order to show I always acted as a lawyer, as a representative of the company and never in my personal capacity."
"The committee is a consultative one, and the only thing they can do is give a recommendation or report, which they should be doing today." He said the committee did not ask him to provide a declaration of assets and had already appeared before the commission regarding this when the issue of the Mgarr company debt had arisen. I explained all the amounts etc and they were satisfied that there are no financial issues. I have published my properties, liabilities and involvement with certain companies in the press." He also presented the documents to his auditors.
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