The resignation of Tourism Minister Clayton Bartolo has escalated into a major scandal amid allegations that his wife, Amanda Muscat, received €50,000 in suspicious payments flagged by the FIAU, Malta’s anti-money laundering agency as revealed by The Times of Malta earlier this afternoon. The Shift news then revealed these were kickbacks linked to a Malta Tourism Authority contract awarded to Italian cyclist Valerio Agnoli.
The payments, from a company connected with Agnoli, were made over a period of six months in 2023, more than two years after Muscat’s contentious consultancy with the ministry ended. A spokesperson for Bartolo said there was no connection between the payments and the MTA and that Muscat was engaged in promoting cycling abroad. The FIAU nonetheless referred the case to the police on suspicion of money laundering.
Reacting to the scandal, Opposition MP Mark Anthony Sammut said in a Facebook post he had flagged Agnoli’s MTA contract a year ago in parliament. “I wasn’t asking questions for nothing,” he said, accusing the government of corruption and warning that “everything eventually comes to light.”
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