Updated | After JPO resignation, PN says Muscat’s careless talk revealed Mistra attack

The Nationalist Party is reiterating claims that it was Labour leader Joseph Muscat who back in 2008, as MEP, inadvertently forewarned them of an imminent attack on Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando in careless talk he had with a member of the PN.

It's been only a week since the PN has attempted to disassociate itself from the former Nationalist MP, now turned independent, Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, by claiming that the MP failed to declare he had negotiated a €1.9 million contract to rent out his Mistra field for the siting of a controversial, open-air disco.

Since then, the PN has accused Muscat of having both publicly, in a TV debate, and privately hinted at Alfred Sant's imminent targeting of the 'green' MP over his Mistra deal.

But Borg Olivier today failed to offer concrete replies as to whether Sant was right when he accused Pullicino Orlando of using his influence in securing a MEPA permit for the Spin Valley disco application on what is a Natura 2000 protected site.

"I won't say whether it was justified or not. Certainly it was an attack that was part of the Labour strategy that Muscat exposed. The issue at stake is why Joseph Muscat is denying, four years later, that he was the source of what Labour was planning to do during the elections," Borg Olivier said.

One of the key controversies in the Mistragate affair is that in March 2008 Pullicino Orlando denied knowing the applicants of the disco on his land; something belied by the January 2008 rental contract he had with the applicants, belatedly revealed by Sant on the last day of the electoral campaign.

The new political blame-game since Pullicino Orlando's resignation from the PN has seen Borg Olivier and several MPs accuse Labour leader Joseph Muscat of letting on the PN to Labour's Mistra attack.

On its part, the PN is denying reports by MaltaToday that a member of its own party, with connections to the Office of the Prime Minister, was the source of the rental contract that was leaked to Labour in the final days of the election, as the PN contemplated an electoral defeat and planned to shift the blame away from its leadership.

Borg Olivier insisted that both former Labour leader Alfred Sant and former secretary-general Jason Micallef have denied having been tipped off by a PN source, but by a 'whistleblower'. MaltaToday has reported that a middleman passed on the contract from a PN source to a Labour official: perhaps unbeknownst to Sant himself. Micallef, on his part, had denied having had the contract passed on to him by a PN source in an interview to MaltaToday.

"The political relevance of this press conference today is that Joseph Muscat has not said the truth, and it is our duty to expose this shortcoming and the lies from Labour."

Borg Olivier also played the clip in which Muscat publicly hints at Labour's imminent targeting of an MP with green credentials.

"It was Labour that first had the information on the Mistra case, and it was Muscat who hinted at the strategy in the offing.  Labour are denying this, saying it is untrue. We are insisting that it was Muscat who betrayed Labour's strategy, by passing on information to a person confidentially. Muscat is trying to hide the fact that he swept the carpet away from Sant's feet."

In a statement issued at 5:07pm, Labour said Borg Olivier's press conference was a ridiculous attempt at confusing matters by lying. "Only Paul Borg Olivier could contemplate the notion that Muscat 'leaked' information during a national broadcast. Borg Olivier should investigate who the person close to the OPM leaked information prior to the 2008 election.

"Borg Olivier would have even invited all the media [Labour press was not called to the press conference] had he not been scared to face our questions."