Farrugia interrogated by police upon return to Malta

Pardoned oil trader George Farrugia was questioned by police at the Floriana headquaters, after landing in Malta from a Rome flight on Tuesday.

He was accompanied by his lawyer Siegfried Borg Cole, with whom he departed from Malta on Sunday after emails published in MaltaToday showed that the oil trader had procured gifts for a regulator's official at the Malta Resources Authority, through oil giant Trafigura.

Farrugia was granted a presidential pardon in February 2013 by the Gonzi administration after it emerged that he was paying Enemalta officials kickbacks for the supply of oil from Trafigura and TOTSA to Enemalta.

New emails published by MaltaToday from 2008 show how pardoned oil trader George Farrugia, was currying favour with key public officials, pointing towards his convenient relationship with state utility Enemalta.

The new revelations raise new questions as to whether a presidential pardon awarded to Farrugia in February 2013, should be withdrawn.

The latest emails show Farrugia receiving sensitive information relating to fuel stocks from a senior manager at Enemalta.

Emmanuel Mizzi, principal at the Shipping Unit of the Petroleum Division at Enemalta, would email Farrugia with details of stock known in the trade as white oils.

In this way Farrugia was made aware of all Enemalta’s remaining oil stocks, and how competitors of companies Trafigura and Totsa, both represented by Farrugia, were acting.

Farrugia sent the email messages he received through the Yahoo email account of his wife Cathy. In other emails, Emmanuel Mizzi’s familiarity with George Farrugia was underlined with the use of slang, denoting a close familiarity: “Hi George, Għalik King – Fuel Oil posted. Cheerio.”