Witnesses confirm not paying for work authorised by former minister's husband

Three witnesses confirm they never paid for works carried out on their properties by a contractor sent by Anthony Debono; defence emphasises role of CMU in upgrading and repairing farm access roads and boundary walls

Former Gozo minister Giovanna Debono accompanied her husband Anthony to Court on Wednesday
Former Gozo minister Giovanna Debono accompanied her husband Anthony to Court on Wednesday

Three witnesses took the stand today in the continuation of the compilation of evidence against Anthony Debono, the husband of former Gozo minister Giovanna Debono.

Debono is facing charges related to the misappropriation of public monies by allegedly carrying out works for private constituents using the budget of the Gozo ministry's construction and maintenance unit. He denies the charges. The prosecution has led to the resignation of his wife Giovanna Debono from the PN, though she retained her seat in the House.

The Gozo works-for-votes allegations were first published in MaltaToday when a whistleblower said he had been left out of pocket when the Nationalist Party was not re-elected, and that works he carried out were left unpaid.

Joseph Cauchi is the first witness to avail himself of Malta's Whistleblower Act. Cauchi claims he was engaged by Debono to carry out specific works but that he could not be paid by the CMU or the Gozo ministry since these works were not officially mandated. Cauchi claims he was owed some €50,000 for his work, and that Debono also paid him in cash for some outstanding dues.

The allegations subsequently saw the arraignment of Anthony Debono, who is facing 13 charges, amongst them misappropriation of public funds, in his alleged role in devising a works-for-votes system to carry out private works for constituents while he ran the Construction Maintenance Unit inside the Gozo ministry.

Carmelo Bajada, resident of Xaghra, who chose to testify even after being notified that he was being investigated by the police, said he was an employee of Heritage Malta and worked some fields part-time in the area known as Tas-Sellum. 

Bajada said that he had reported to the CMU that the narrow track dividing his family's land from government land was often flooded with water because of bad irrigation. 

He said that rocks and stones on the boundary wall of the government land often fell onto the road, blocking access. Public works employees would then have to go on site to repair the damage. 

Bajada said he had visited the CMU to report the damage and that he had been passed on to Anthony Debono. 

"I told Debono that there was a lot of water, causing extensive damage to the walls," he told Magistrate Neville Camilleri.

He confirmed, when asked, that the defendant was the person he had spoken to at CMU. 

Bajada said Debono had told him he had visited the site and told him work would need to be done on the boundary wall, but not at that time. 

"In March 2011, when I went to the property, there was a concrete mixer on site, belonging to Sansone, who were paving the road in concrete," he said. 

The wall was not touched or repaired at all, he confirmed. 

Bajada said that the road was on his family's land. 

When asked, he said that he had not paid anyone for the work carried out. 

On further questioning by the prosecution, he confirmed that he knew about the concrete work in advance so much so that he had advised his second cousin who owned part of the land adjacent to his. 

During the counter-interrogation, Bajada said that the track between the government's land and the private fields below it was often flooded and obstructed with rockfalls from the boundary wall around the government land. 

Defence lawyer Joe Giglio asked him to confirm that the only reason he had reported the damage to the public works department because the damage was being caused by the water coming off the government land. 

Bajada also exhibited a photo showing narrow passages drilled in the government land boundary wall to syphon the water through the wall instead of having it flow over it. 

Giglio asked him if he had ever expected to pay for the work carried out to repair damage caused because of the government land. 

"No, of course not, and even my father confirmed that when used to work the fields, public works employees would frequently go to try and patch the track," Bajada said.

The second witness, George Formosa, said that he lived in Gharb, and that he had been warned by the police that part of a wall around his field needed to be replaced within three days because it posed a danger. 

Formosa said he had panicked and that he visited the defendant in his office in Xewkija, and that Debono told him he would ask the police to grant him more time. 

The police had confirmed three days later that they would allow him more time.

"Debono told me that he would help me, and told me straight away that he would provide the stone but would not provide workers or remove the waste or debris," he said. 

Formosa said that Joe Cauchi, Is-Sansone, came on site to take down the wall and delivered it to Dr Borg of the Kempinsky, as he had been advised to do by Debono. 

"Some days later, as Debono had told me to do, I contacted Carmel Azzopardi who then brought me the stone for the wall," he said. "My brothers and I built the wall ourselves."

Giglio confirmed that the wall surrounded a field belonging to the family, where they grew roses to dry them so they could sell the seeds. 

Formosa said that his land stood higher than the level of the road and that not the entire wall needed to be replaced. 

Giglio asked the witness if he had seen similar high walls like his in other places around Gozo. 

"I have seen them," he said. 

Prodded by Giglio he confirmed that other high walls near Ta' Pinu, in Dwejra and Mgarr had all been repaired or replaced. 

"I do not know who paid for that work," he said. 

The final witness of the day, Sam Camilleri, said that he had asked Debono if the roads and tracks around the fields in Gharb where he and his family and other families owned some land could be widened to facilitate access for agriculture equipment. 

He said that after that, Joe Cauchi, Is-Sansun, had turned up to carry out the work necessary, including five ramps and the widening of two roads. 

Formosa confirmed he had never paid for the work. 

He also referred to some work carried out in a house in a barrier belonging to his family. 

He had contracted Cauchi directly to do some excavation work around the property and to replace the drainage system. 

For that work, he had paid Cauchi directly and in full. He exhibited a copy of a cheque for €2,886 paid to Cauchi as full settlement for the work he had contracted him for. 

In his counter-interrogation, Formosa said that the work carried out in an area known as Tas-Sisien and in Wied il-Mielah was to provide access for farmers and owners who owned other agricultural land in the area. 

"Even the ramps you mentioned are actually farm access roads in effect, am I right?" the defence lawyer prodded him. 

"That's right," he said. "All these ramps provide access  to land and fields above or below."

"Did you in fact go to the CMU to have these roads widened because you knew that this actually part of the CMU's official remit?" Giglio asked him. 

"I think I might have first gone to the local council and they directed me to the CMU," Formosa said. "Unless it was actually Cauchi himself who told me to go there."

Formosa confirmed that the cheque he paid Cauchi with, for the work on the house in the barrier in Gharb, was in fact payable to himself and that Cauchi had asked him to sign it on the back. 

He had never received a receipt for the cheque.

Opposition: Whistleblower was “bribed by the government”

On 5 February, Opposition leader Simon Busuttil claimed the Gozitan contractor turned whistleblower had been “bribed by the government”.

Busuttil said it was “shocking” that after the whistleblower, Joseph Cauchi, turned state witness in the case against Anthony Debono, he won numerous contracts for works in government schools, including about “€500,000 worth of jobs” through the Foundation for Tomorrow Schools (FTS) – the foundation at the centre of investigation over allegations of impropriety involving its former procurement officer, Edward Caruana, the former canvasser and driver of education minister Evarist Bartolo.

“The government bribed this Gozitan contractor [Joseph Cauchi] to destroy a family, to destroy Giovanna Debono and her husband, and to harm the Nationalist Party.

“These are people without scruples. They bribed him and protected him from court action and rewarded him with a half a million in contracts … Under this government, everyone has a price, and the price of this Judas was €500,000 in contracts,” the Opposition leader said.