Curia strikes €50 million lease deal with son of former Saudi minister

Malta’s Archbishop’s Curia is set to earn up to €50 million from a long-term lease of the former Apap Institute in Santa Venera, after striking a deal with a company controlled by Hani Ahmad Zaki Yamani, the son of Saudi Arabia’s influential former oil minister, Ahmed Zaki Yamani.

According to documents reviewed by The Shift, Archbishop Charles Scicluna signed a 30-year concession in June, granting control of the shuttered retirement home to Integra Wellness Clinic Ltd, a Maltese vehicle incorporated only weeks before the agreement was signed.

The company plans to convert the site into a high-end wellness centre specialising in non-invasive medical treatments.

The contract is expected to generate between €1 and €2.4 million annually in rental income for the Curia, despite the absence of a public tender or expression of interest.

The lack of transparency around the process has unsettled some senior Church officials, with the Archbishop’s office declining to answer media questions and instructing staff not to comment on the transaction.

Integra Wellness Clinic Ltd is registered at the Valletta offices of lawyer Adriano Cefai, who serves as its sole director and company secretary. Its sole shareholder is a Cyprus-based entity – Haniya Holding Limited – ultimately owned by Yamani.

Although well-known in Saudi business circles, Yamani is listed in Maltese filings as Kittitian/Nevisian and maintains a registered address in Qormi alley, used by other foreign nationals.

No planning application has yet been submitted for the significant alterations required to convert the former care home into a private medical facility.

Yamani, sometimes referred to as “Sheikh Hani Yamani”, is associated with Hazi Trading, a long-standing Saudi conglomerate active in oil, engineering and services, with multi-billion-dollar projects across the Middle East and Africa.

His father, Ahmed Zaki Yamani, Saudi oil minister from 1962 until 1986, was a pivotal figure in the development of the global oil industry.

A principal architect of OPEC’s rise, he oversaw the transfer of Aramco from US corporate control to the Saudi state, laying the groundwork for what would become one of the world’s most valuable companies.

The Apap Institute served as a residential care facility for the elderly for 80 years until it was abruptly closed at the end of 2024.

Managed since 1944 by the Dominican sisters, the Curia, which owns the property, has decided to close the massive home in just a few weeks, citing a lack of nuns, vocations, and funds to keep it running.

Approximately 30 elderly residents still in the care of the nuns and some staff members were relocated to other elderly care facilities when the institute was closed.

At the time, the Archbishop’s decision was met with anger and disdain by several families and relatives of the elderly residents, insisting that the Church was rushing to turn the building into another money-making machine.

At the time, the Church denied the claims.