[WATCH] Demands for magistrate’s recusal not driven by fear, Muscat insists

Former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat insists his demands for the removal of the magistrate overseeing the hospitals inquiry is not driven by fear.

“I fear nothing and no one, that is a stupid question to ask, if you read what has been said, you realise that what you are saying does not make sense,” Muscat told journalists when asked whether his demands were driven by fear.

The former PM is set to testify in the Public Accounts Committee on Tuesday afternoon. He will answer questions about the National Audit Office investigation into the contract granted to consortium Electrogas for the Delimara gas plant.

Muscat’s lawyers have requested the inquiry be halted until a decision on his request for the removal of the magistrate conducting the inquiry into the hospitals privatisation deal be taken.

He made the request as part of a constitutional application filed on his behalf by lawyer Charlon Gouder, following the inquiring magistrate’s refusal of his application requesting her recusal.

Muscat’s lawyer had originally argued that the inquiring magistrate should recuse herself because her father and brother had shared Facebook posts by Repubblika in 2019 and it had been Repubblika that filed the initial report which had led to the inquiry. Another family member had also “written against the party (Labour), which many times is synonymous with the leader (“mexxej”) and associates them with the dodgy dealings (“taħwid”) relating to the hospitals,” reads the application.

The application also stressed that before she was elevated to the Bench, Magistrate Vella had practised law at her father’s law firm, together with her brother. This meant that this meant her relationship to these two of his detractors “was closer than simply blood ties.”