John Dalli can be indicted over €60 million snus bribe, court rules

A court has declared that it had seen sufficient evidence to indict former EU Commissioner John Dalli, as the compilation of evidence against him continued today.

Earlier this month, Dalli was charged with trading in influence and attempted bribery over an alleged €60 million bribe requested by his former aide, Silvio Zammit, to help lift an EU-wide ban on snus tobacco.
 
Magistrate Caroline Farrugia Frendo ruled on Friday afternoon that there was enough prima facie evidence for Dalli to be placed under a bill of indictment.   

Earlier during the hearing, former employees of British American Tobacco (BAT) Malta testified to having been asked by its overseas head office to set up contact with Dalli on behalf of the European Smokeless Tobacco lobby, ESTOC.

The request was sent on to BAT from the company’s head office in Greece, attempting to open a communications channel with the former commissioner.

One former sales manager at BAT Malta testified to how his superiors in Greece had sought his assistance. Their request was passed on to Zammit, who operated a restaurant in Sliema.

Zammit had asked for an agenda for the proposed meeting, which was sent to Dalli from the tobacco company’s head office and a meeting was scheduled for August.

Saliba accompanied ESTOC official Tomas Hammargren to the meeting on the agreed date at the Kempinski hotel in Gozo. 

Hammargren had presented the commissioner with a PWC study on smokeless tobacco carried out in Sweden and had showed Dalli some samples of snus.

Asked what the result of the meeting was, he said he hadn’t seen anything and everyone had gone on his way. The meeting had lasted about 15 minutes.

Since Zammit used to sell their products at his shop and was regularly visited by their salesman, he could help get in touch with the former commissioner.

“We knew him as he had a restaurant in Sliema and used to sell our products. I knew him from business.”

“Why did you choose Zammit out of all your clients?” asked lawyer Antoine Agius Bonnici, prosecuting on behalf of the Office of the Attorney General.

“Why did you choose Zammit?” asked the prosecutor. “We knew he was involved in politics…he knew John Dalli,” replied the witness.

Asked why the meeting with Dalli took place, the witness said he did not know and had only been told to arrange the meeting by his bosses.

The witness said that the meeting had taken place at the hotel bar.

“So it was in a public place not in some closed room,” asked lawyer Stephen Tonna Lowell in cross-examination. “Yes,” the witness confirmed. 

Saliba’s former underling, Clint Bajada, currently manager at BAT Malta, also testified briefly on Friday.

He said that Saliba, who was his superior 2010, had said that Zammit could help him set up a meeting with Dalli and so he had sent him a request. Zammit got back to him five months later, asking if he was the one who asked for the meeting.

Bajada had told Zammit not to bother with the meeting due to the lapse of time since they made contact, but Zammit replied that he had already informed Dalli and so the meeting was arranged.

When the day of the meeting arrived, Bajada had accompanied Saliba and “the foreigner who came from abroad” to Gozo.

He told the court that he had waited outside in the car for some 15 minutes while the other men went into the hotel and had no further information about the meeting.

Asked if he recognised anyone in the courtroom, Bajada said that today was the first time that he had ever seen Dalli in person. He had only seen him on TV before, he said.

The first witness was called back into the courtroom to explain why the meeting had taken place in Gozo. “Zammit had told us that Dalli was to be in Gozo and so we could meet him there,” Saliba explained. 

Former assistant commissioner Michael Cassar also took the witness stand on Friday, telling the court how he had been called into police commissioner John Rizzo’s office, where he was told that a meeting had been arranged with then Attorney General Peter Grech and his deputy at the time Donatella Frendo Dimech, to discuss an OLAF report concerning an alleged €60 million bribe to lift the EU ban on snus.

He recalled that the report had reached the conclusion that there was a case of trading in influence with regards to Silvio Zammit, but that further investigations were needed into Dalli and lawyer Gayle Kimberly. 

The decision was taken to use the OLAF report as intelligence and start the investigation from the beginning. The information in the report was used as guidance, he said.

Several arrests had been made and their statements recorded on cassette tapes.

The court appointed an IT expert to convert the tapes into CD format for transcription purposes. 

He said the story had begun in 2011 with a meeting between Dalli and Hammergren, with Zammit’s involvement, he said.

Investigations had revealed that Hammergren and Kimberly had been romantically involved at one point, the former police chief added.

Cassar told the court that Zammit had assured Kimberly that the snus ban could be lifted at a cost running into “six zeros”.

Zammit had mentioned the figure of €60 million during a subsequent meeting between Zammit and Swedish Match representative Johan Gabrielsson, he said.

But when Gabrielsson passed on the message to his superiors, he was instructed to break off all contact with Zammit.

As the sitting drew to a close, the court decreed that there was sufficient prima facie evidence for Dalli to be indicted. 

The case was adjourned to March for the testimony of OLAF officials.

Superintendent James Grech and AG lawyer Antoine Agius Bonnici prosecuted. Lawyers Stephen Tonna Lowell and Stefano Filletti were defence counsel.