VGH inquiry fallout: DF lawyers out of Shoreline, Convenience Shop boards

Aqra bil-Malti

Public-listed companies, The Convenience Shop (Holding) PLC and Shoreline Mall PLC have distanced themselves from individuals involved in the fraudulent hospitals deal following the conclusions of the magisterial inquiry, which identified criminal activity and the siphoning of millions in taxpayers’ funds.

Among those individuals are lawyers Kevin Deguara and Jean Carl Farrugia, the founding partners of DF Advocates. They provided counsel to Vitals Global Healthcare and Technoline.

Deguara and Farrugia appeared in court last week and face charges of money laundering and actively participating in criminal activity and criminal association.

Shoreline Mall and The Convenience Shop (Holding) announced the lawyers’ departures from their respective boards of directors through separate company announcements.

Shoreline Mall said Deguara and Farrugia immediately tendered their resignations from the board.

The Shoreline investment, where Deguara and Farrugia are private shareholders in the multi-million-euro project, bought land from Smart City to develop into a fully-fledged real estate project and shopping mall.

At the time, disgraced OPM Chief of Staff Keith Schembri represented the government on the board of Smart City, later replaced by Kurt Farrugia.

The announcement did not explain their sudden departure but was published shortly following their arraignment in court.

According to the company announcement, Ryan Edward Otto, a South African citizen who bought a Maltese passport and the largest shareholder in the Kalkara project, has been appointed board chairman.

The Convenience Shop, which has rapidly flourished into one of the biggest supermarket chains in Malta over the last decade, also announced Deguara’s resignation.

According to the announcement, Deguara resigned from the board and membership of the audit committee “for personal reasons”.

Deguara’s recent resignations follow those announced last week, when he resigned from the boards of companies related to the DIZZ group, which is controlled by Diane Izzo and her husband, Karl Izzo.

Deguara still sits on the boards of other publicly listed companies, such as Horizon Finance plc. He is also the President of Zabbar’s football club, St Patrick’s.

His business partner, Jean Carl Farrugia, currently acts as board secretary to publicly listed companies that own the Busy Bee confectionery business and Browns Pharmacies, among others.

Through his connections with Brown’s shareholders, Deguara is also a member of the committee of Valletta FC, whose acting president is Brown’s owner, Alexander Fenech.