Earlier this week, Malta’s economy received a hammer blow from the Financial Action Taskforce, after the global money-laundering and terrorist-financing watchdog voted to put Malta on its grey list for not doing enough to tackle financial crime.
In the days leading up to the organisation’s final verdict, a delegation from the Maltese government, led by Finance Minister Clyde Caruana, met with FATF officials to try and prevent Malta from joining countries like Panama, Nicaragua, Syria and Myanmar and becoming the only EU country on the grey list.
Bis-Serjetà can exclusively reveal some of the things the delegation said to convince the FATF, as relayed to us by a source close to the negotiations…
“You’ve got the wrong country. It’s Mali you’re after. Easy mistake to make – they’re right above Malta on the list of countries. We accidentally click it all the time when filling out online forms.”
“This is bullying. Yes we put own head in the toilet bowl, but you don’t have to flush.”
“Do you even watch Pjazza? If you did, you’d know Malta is the best country in the world.”
“Arrest Joseph Muscat? You can’t be serious. Do you know how many people still support him? It would be like trying to arrest God.”
“OK – how about we arrest a village grocer for misappropriating €50? Would that work?”
“We’re prosecuting Keith Schembri aren’t we? We have to go easy on him because he has cancer, miskin. But in five years’ time we’ll start the trial, maybe, if he’s feeling better, miskin.”
“What do you mean it’s weird that our current prime minister once acted as a lawyer for the country’s biggest crime family?”
“It was Rosianne Cutajar’s oranges wasn’t it? We knew it. No problem – we can get rid of her. She doesn’t do anything anyway.”
“If you don’t grey list us, we’ll deliver a suitcase with €3 million to your headquarters…wait what are you writing? Don’t write anything! It was a joke!”
“Your jealousy is our energy.”
“When you write your report, can you say it was mainly because of Bernard Grech’s letter?”
“You know what? We don’t care if you grey list us. We’ll still win the next election by a landslide. 40K 🍋🍋🍋.”
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