Transparency Inc.

“I answer all questions… I am fully transparent,” Robert Abela boldly declared just days ago.  Yet his MPs have just blocked the Public Accounts Committee from asking Film Commissioner Johann Grech pertinent questions.

One burning question Robert Abela’s deputies don’t want answered is: Where did €7.2 million of our taxes go?

That is our money.  We have every right to know what’s been done with it. Yet Labour is desperately trying to keep that information from us.

The Malta Film Commission’s estimated spend according to the 2024 budget was €1.8 million.  Yet Film Commissioner and Labour’s favourite Johann Grech spent €8.9 million. That’s a 500% overspend.

What’s even more galling is that Grech refused to divulge where €7.2 million went.  He refused to provide the National Audit Office with the requested documentation.  He then refused to provide the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) with that information.

The PAC requested a breakdown of payments made by the Film Commission and the relevant invoices.  The four Labour MPs sitting on the PAC agreed to that request in February.

The Film Commissioner provided only a redacted breakdown of payments.  He didn’t specify who received the €7.2 million, when the money was paid, or provide the invoices. The public was left none the wiser about where its €7.2 million had gone.

In May, the PN MPs on the PAC made another attempt to get to the truth. They made the same requests to Grech when he appeared before them.  With unbelievable arrogance, Grech refused to reply. He was directly challenged to explain the €7.2 million discrepancy between the allocated budget and the actual expenditure.  He failed to provide an answer.

He was confronted about the 10-minute film, ‘Once Upon a Time in Malta’, which the Malta Film Commission produced and in which the Film Commissioner himself plays a role, together with David Walliams.  He was asked about the final cost of that 10-minute vanity project.  He threw a figure of €560,000, but then failed to clarify whether this was actually the final cost.

When the PN MPs requested Grech continue to testify in another sitting, Labour’s MPs sprang to Grech’s rescue.  They blocked the committee from forcing Grech to reappear before the committee, which had already been scheduled for the following week.

Those Labour MPs, particularly Alex Muscat, had done everything possible to shield Grech from further questioning.  Muscat constantly interrupted and put the spokes in the wheels of proceedings at the PAC.  Why is Labour so desperate to conceal where those millions went?  If Abela is so transparent, why does he put in so much effort in concealing the facts?

PAC Chairman Darren Carabott was compelled to take the issue up in parliament with Speaker Anglu Farrugia. Carabott complained that despite having requested the Malta Film Commissioner to provide the secret invoices and explain where he’d spent those €7.2 million, Grech defiantly refused to comply.

Despite repeated communication from the PAC’s clerk and the involvement of the Permanent Secretary, Grech still wouldn’t budge. And to add insult to injury, he informed the PAC that he would not be disclosing any further information requested.

Even the notoriously pro-Labour Speaker was forced to admit that the PAC had every right to haul the Film Commissioner back before it to answer those questions. He ruled that the PAC members were well within their rights to request further clarification from Grech. He insisted that witnesses appearing before the committee are obliged to “answer questions carefully, fully and honestly”.

Witnesses, the Speaker pointed out, are obliged to “provide full and truthful information”. Referring to Erskine May, Speaker Farrugia emphasised that it is the duty of the PAC “to scrutinise government spending and excess votes”.

He insisted that the PAC had a “mandate to ensure accountability and transparency in public spending”. But the wily Speaker added that key caveat: “the members of the Public Accounts Committee, should they so agree, are to decide whether to send for Johann Grech again”.

That’s not going to happen.  Labour MPs constitute the majority in that committee.  They’re never going to allow “accountability and transparency” when they know what’s going on at the Malta Film Commission.  They view their role in that committee as one of enforcing secrecy, keeping the public in the dark.

They’re dead set on preventing any scrutiny of government spending, especially when Grech is funnelling those millions to companies that provide Labour with all the services it requires for its mass meetings and party events. They obviously have clear instructions from above to block any disclosure of where our millions are going.

In February, Robert Abela’s MPs on the committee agreed to request detailed information from Grech about his spending. Now they’ve changed their mind. Labour’s Alex Muscat said there was “no need to keep dragging this matter out”.

We know why Labour is intent on keeping everything covered up. A brief glance at where Grech’s direct orders went reveals a pattern.

The beneficiaries are companies that supplied Labour with stages, lights, sound, LED screens and other props for its multi-million-euro election campaign. Ray Vella and Co Ltd supplied Labour with massive LED screens for its mass meetings.  Carmelo Magro’s TEC Ltd built stages for Labour’s mass events. Nexos provides Labour with campaign lighting. Besteam Audio supplies Labour’s audio. AF Sign Studio provides Labour with its billboards. Sharpshoot Media, G Media and Mad About Video are all involved in servicing Labour. And they’ve all been handsomely rewarded through Grech’s generosity with our money.

Those are the ones we know about.

Robert Abela is not transparent, as he falsely claims to be. He boasts about his transparency, yet behind the scenes, he guards every detail like a state secret, withholding data, dodging questions, and burying inconvenient facts under layers of vague explanations.

His “transparency” is just a performance. A carefully crafted illusion that effectively keeps us all in the dark.