Prime Minister changes rules by stealth to control public contracts’ appeals

Prime Minister Robert Abela has silently changed the rules of the composition of the Public Contracts Review Board (PCRB) in an apparent attempt to influence and control how the government determines appeals to multi-million-euro tenders.

In the latest in a series of legal moves Abela has taken to control the work of institutions, a new legal notice amending the island’s public procurement regulations introduced changes.

No discussions were held before the amendments were published. The government also refrained from announcing the changes.

Through the new amendments, Abela has now deleted provisions in the law on how substitute members of the PCRB are appointed. Instead, he introduced new provisions to appoint new substitute members and change them according to the nature of the appeals being heard by the board.

The new regulations do not specify how members should be temporarily changed, leaving ample room for interpretation by stating that this shall be done “whenever the circumstances require”.

No “circumstances” are specified, leaving it to the prime minister or the finance minister to decide.

On the same day that the prime minister changed the rules, he immediately appointed substitute members with different terms of appointment.

The appointees are Richard Matrenza, a veteran Labour stalwart now in his 80s, lawyer Ana Thomas, a member of Labour’s Lead programme, Ing Damien Gatt, and Lawrence Ancilleri. They can now substitute Chairman Kenneth Swain, Vice Chairman Vincent Micallef, and Victor Grech whenever the prime minister needs.

Legal sources told The Shift that while they were surprised by the new move, they interpret it as a result of a court ruling last year in which two board members, including the Chair, were found to have a conflict of interest.

The Court’s decision annulled a €600 million contract for the award of an incinerator given to Bonnici Brothers.

Bonnici Brothers are closely connected to Abela – the prime minister was their business partner of the company’s managing director before becoming Labour leader.

The Court had declared that Chairman Kenneth Swain and Vice Chair Vince Micallef had not declared their conflict of interest in the case they decided in favour of the government.

The same tender is again before the PCRB, and the government insists it should go to the Bonnici Brothers.

“So, instead of removing the two culprits from the PCRB, Abela has now decided to change the rules so that he can continue to decide how appeals are heard and decided. He will now have the facility to choose which members to hear an appeal, and this is for obvious reasons,” a senior commercial lawyer told The Shift.

Controlling the institutions

The changes in the public procurement rules are the latest in a series by Abela to influence how ‘independent’ authorities work.

In 2023, Abela refused to nominate a Standards Commissioner in agreement with the Opposition as the law stipulated.

Instead, he changed the law, introducing a so-called anti-deadlock mechanism so he could bypass the Opposition.

Abela appointed former Chief Justice Joe Azzopardi to the post through these changes, against the Opposition’s wishes.

Recently, Abela also introduced a law to change how magisterial inquiries against members of his cabinet are to be requested.

The law now stipulates that citizens can no longer go directly to a magistrate to ask for a probe. Instead, they are forced to go to the police and wait at least six months until the police commissioner, who the prime minister appoints, concludes his findings, if anything is done.

The prime minister also refuses to publish his cabinet’s 2023 declarations of assets, breaking a tradition of some 30 years. Instead, he said he wanted to change the rules on this too.

No rules have been presented yet, and the declarations remain secret despite the Standards Commissioner’s recommendation to publish them.

The latest declarations published in 2022 raised serious doubts about their veracity, particularly those presented by Robert and Lydia Abela.