Dodgy people and dodgy deals: Joseph Muscat tied to ‘fake and deeply troubling’ network

Disgraced former prime minister Joseph Muscat has resurfaced in another controversial business venture, this time lending his name to a recently launched crypto token already facing warnings over possible market manipulation and questionable claims.

Muscat, who spent years promoting Malta as ‘Blockchain Island’ during his premiership, has joined the advisory board of the Commonwealth Union Blockchain token, known as $CWU.

The project presents itself as a digital platform supposedly designed to connect the Commonwealth’s 56 member nations and 2.6 billion people. Yet the organisation openly admits it has no official link to the actual Commonwealth.

The token has already attracted scrutiny from crypto market monitors. Platforms including CoinGecko and Rugcheck warned investors that the token carries a high risk of market manipulation because a huge portion of the supply is concentrated in a small number of unidentified wallets.

Analysts flagged the structure as deeply suspicious after reports emerged that 73% of all tokens were distributed among 195 wallets created within a single second at launch, suggesting centralised control by a handful of insiders.

Despite grand claims of representing a vast international economic network worth trillions, trading activity in the token has remained extremely limited, further casting doubt on the project’s legitimacy.

The controversy deepened after former Maldivian foreign minister and ex-President of the UN General Assembly Abdulla Shahid publicly distanced himself from the initiative.

Shahid described the project’s claims as “fake and deeply troubling” and insisted he had no involvement in any cryptocurrency scheme, despite his name initially appearing on the advisory board. His details were later removed from the project’s website.

Muscat’s involvement is particularly striking given his history with the crypto sector. During his time in office, Malta aggressively courted crypto companies by advertising itself as a lightly regulated jurisdiction.

The government’s “Blockchain Island” campaign attracted major international operators, including Binance, which was publicly embraced by Muscat’s administration before Maltese regulators later clarified the company was never authorised to operate under local financial supervision.

Binance would eventually admit to serious failures in its anti-money laundering controls and agree to pay more than $4 billion in penalties to US authorities.

Since being forced out of office in 2020 amid the political crisis triggered by the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, Muscat has repeatedly surfaced in connection with controversial international business and political networks.

Among the most persistent examples are his ties to authoritarian Azerbaijan. Muscat was a speaker at the Global Baku Forum, where he praised the regime of Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev and promoted his government’s relationship with the oil-rich state as a diplomatic success story.

His links to Azerbaijan date back to 2014, when Muscat travelled to Baku alongside former minister Konrad Mizzi and former chief of staff Keith Schembri for secretive meetings with Aliyev’s government.

Those discussions later paved the way for the controversial Electrogas energy deal, one of the most scandal-ridden projects associated with Muscat’s administration.

Aliyev’s family was also linked to the Pilatus Bank scandal, but warmly welcomed in Malta.

Investigations over the years have repeatedly highlighted connections between the Electrogas project, secret offshore companies, and figures close to Muscat’s inner circle. Azerbaijan’s ruling family was also linked to revelations involving Dubai company 17 Black, identified as a target client for offshore structures owned by Mizzi and Schembri.

Even after leaving office, Muscat continued travelling to Azerbaijan, publicly praising the regime’s “achievements” while human rights groups condemned Aliyev’s government for repression, corruption and attacks on journalists and political opponents.

Muscat has also faced scrutiny over consultancy work for Swiss company Accutor AG, which played a role in financial transactions connected to the Vitals Global Healthcare scandal – the fraudulent hospitals concession deal that has led to criminal charges against the former prime minister and several other members of government and associates.

Muscat denies wrongdoing and continues to proclaim his innocence in court. Yet his growing list of post-politics business dealings, from controversial consultancy arrangements to dubious crypto projects and close associations with authoritarian regimes, continues to reinforce accusations that the disgraced former prime minister has leveraged political influence for personal gain long after leaving office.