Perm sec grilled over ‘postman’ role in passport programme selection

Opposition MPs criticise Kevin Mahoney for failing to screen members of an evaluation committee that selected Henley and Partners as citizenship programme concessionaires for potential conflicts of interest

The permanent secretary at the home affairs ministry was hit by criticism from Opposition MPs over his role in the run-up to the selection of Henley and Partners as concessionaires for Malta’s citizenship sale programme. 

At a public accounts committee meeting, Opposition MPs Jason Azzopardi and Tonio Fenech accused Kevin Mahoney of acting as a “figurehead and a postman”, rather than taking the necessary decisions.

Mahoney insisted that he was serving as a “facilitator for a process led by government at a political level”. 

The public accounts committee is scrutinizing the partially-published contract between the government and Henley and Partners.

Fenech started by questioning Mahoney why the public service concession was only advertised in the local press, arguing that promoting it in the international press could have attracted more bidders.

Mahoney said that he was simply following recommendations set by justice minister Owen Bonnici, at the time parliamentary secretary for justice, and denied Fenech’s claim that the government had already reached an agreement with Henley prior to the selection process.

“I assumed that foreign companies interested in the programme would have discovered about it through the local press,” he said.

The permanent secretary then recounted how he had sent dossiers containing procedural guidelines to the interested applicants that were sent to him by Bonnici’s office.

When questioned by Fenech as to how  he ensured that the dossier respected procurement regulations, Mahoney said that he had read it personally and found nothing wrong with it.

“Besides, I had the comfort of mind that Bonnici had received clearance from the Attorney General before sending it to me,” he said, a claim that was verified on the spot by Bonnici, also a member of the PAC.

Mahoney then recounted how he had appointed an evaluation committee to evaluate the three applicants – Henley and Partners, Arton Capital, and KPMG – according to Bonnici’s recommendations.

The three chosen members were Malta Enterprise chairman Mario Vella, Revenue Commissioner Marvin Gaerty, and audit firm Nexia BT partner Karl Cini.

Responding to Fenech’s questions. Mahoney admitted that he hadn’t personally screened the three board members for potential conflicts of interest, as he had assumed that such screening had occurred before Bonnici had recommended them to him. 

Henley and Partners came out on top with 78 marks, with Arton receiving 66 marks and KPMG excluded because they didn’t meet a certain criterion that Mahoney couldn’t name on the spot.

His admittance to ignorance as to what the criteria were based on and his claim that he had simply received the final report and published it on the minsitry’s website led to harsh criticism from Fenech and Azzopardi, with the latter bluntly accusing him of acting as a “figurehead”.

Mahoney insisted that he was acting as an “interface and a facilitator” and the process was being coordinated by “the government at a political level, over and above any particular ministry”

“Ministries should design policy and civil servants should implement them,” Fenech said. “In this case, the civil servant simply acted as a postman.” 

After Henley was chosen to be the Maltese government's concessionaire, Arton Capital contested the decision. But its appeal was turned down by a board of appeal chaired by Malta Industrial Parks deputy chairman Joshua Zammit, Reno Borg (a PL delegate on the Broadcasting Authority) and Adrian Said – now chairman at Project Malta.

Again, Mahoney said that he had chosen the board members following advice from Bonnici, that he hadn’t even known who Adrian Said was, and that he hadn’t scanned the names for potential conflicts of interest.

“I assumed that the parliamentary secretary had already received the necessary legal advice before sending the names to me,” he said.

In another testimony, Anthony Cachia - director general at the Department of Contracts - admitted that his department weren’t consulted on whether the citizenship programme should be offered as a public service concession or a public contract.

“It’s a legal issue and it’s up to the minister to decide,” he explained.