Updated | Vassallo told court minister mooted Lowenbrau compromise, Azzopardi plays down claim

Court case Vassallo Builders brought against Lands Department shows Nazzareno Vassallo testified that in 2011 the minister for lands told him a compromise on the Qormi land was possible

Nazzareno Vassallo
Nazzareno Vassallo

The chairman of Vassallo Builders Group had testified in court that it was the minister responsible for lands who in 2011 assured him that a compromise would be found after the Lands Department demanded that VBGL pay a higher premium for government land in Qormi.

The testimony was presented to the press by Justice Minister Owen Bonnici, as part of the court case that Nazzareno Vassallo brought against the Lands Department, which in 2011 demanded a higher payment for the direct dominium of government land sold on to him.

The land in Qormi had been leased by the State to the Marsovin winery on condition that it be used as a brewery, but when in 2009 Marsovin sought to redeem the emphyteusis – just weeks before selling the 22,000 square metre land for €8 million to Vassallo – the Lands Department dropped the onerous condition for the land to be used as a brewery.

In 2011, when the then Labour opposition insisted that the land should have been disposed by parliamentary resolution, the Lands Department convened a committee of architects to issue a new valuation of the direct dominium – which would have been the premium payable to the State for dropping the brewery condition. The new valuation was decided at €700,000 but Vassallo is contesting the value in court.

The National Audit Office, in an investigation on the sale of the land, has said that the land should have not been let go by the State for anything less than €8 million.

Bonnici said there was no doubt that Azzopardi’s ‘compromise’ was crucial for the land to be granted to Marsovin for the price at which it originally redeemed the empyteusis.

The architects picked to re-value the direct dominium have however insisted that they were tasked with the valuation of the brewery condition, and not of the land itself.

“What was the compromise? It was the appoinment of the three architects by Azzopardi who based themselves on the original value of the land as it was granted back in 1990, and not on the value of the land as it stood in 2012,” Bonnici said today.

“On one hand Azzopardi has told the NAO that he assumed responsibility for the appointment of the architects, but now Azzopardi claims the minister being referred to by Vassallo is Tonio Fenech (then finance minister). If Fenech offerred the compromise, then Azzopardi sealed it,” Bonnici said.

Former lands minister, Nationalist MP Jason Azzopardi, has denied having been responsible for the original 2009 decision and has sued Owen Bonnici for libel.

Jason Azzopardi reacts

Jason Azzopardi once again accused Bonnici of dishonesty, saying the minister was “caught out” when he revealed documents of testimony by Nazzareno Vassallo that appeared to undermine his version of the circumstances surrounding the Lowenbrau land.

Azzopardi said that on Xarabank, Bonnici had said that it was Zaren Vassallo himself who, while testifying under oath, had stated that he had met with the minister and told him he was ready to discuss a compromise on the Lowenbrau land. “Owen Bonnici has been saying for two weeks that I met Zaren Vassallo to reach a compromise. I immediately filed libel proceedings and this assertion has now been confirmed as a complete lie.”

Azzopardi claims Bonnici was caught in a lie when he said that the Auditor General had not known about the cpiry testimony. “This is another lie because the Auditor General himself says on page 46 of the report that he had seen the testimony that had been tendered before the first court. This is another lie that Bonnici must answer for... Any Tom, Dick or Harry can go to court and read it because it's part of a civil case. And the government had [these documents] in hand.”

Taking questions from the media, Azzopardi explained that the architects evaluating the land had decided to use 1990 values, and not 2009 ones, because 1990 was the date the perpetual emphytheusis was entered into. The formula then used for the redemption of ground rent is twenty times the annual ground rent for the land, he explained.

”It is evident that the PL has entered into a siege mentality,” Azzopardi said. “Which government targets individuals who hold power to account?”