Tag: Dalligate

Film Portrays Dalligate
The French film director Antoine Raimbault has released a movie about disgraced European Commissioner John Dalli, who was stripped of his role after the EU’s anti-fraud agency claimed he had failed to declare a tobacco-related bribery attempt, reports Malta Today.
The case dates from 2012, when Dalli’s aide Silvio Zammit allegedly tried to obtain a €60 million ($71.17 million) bribe from Swedish Match to reverse the EU ban on snus. The company rejected the offer as improper and reported it to the European Commission.
Une Affaire de Principe–marketed as Smoke Signals in English–recounts the story from the point of view of one of Dalli’s sole champions at the time, Jose Bove, a French farmer and member of the European Parliament for the Green party who is perhaps best known for dismantling a McDonald’s franchise in 1999 to protest new U.S. restrictions on importing Roquefort cheese and to raise awareness about McDonald’s’ use of hormone-treated beef.
Bove suspects Dalli’s defenestration was related to the tobacco industry’s desire to postpone the Tobacco Products Directive.
John Dalli, who has occupied no political post since his ouster from Brussels in October 2012, has always protested his innocence, claiming he was unaware of Zammit’s actions.
May 10, 2024
Dalli: ‘No Evidence for Snus Bribery Allegation’

Photo: Kirill Ryzhov
Former European Commissioner John Dalli, who stands accused of trading in influence and attempted bribery to help lift the EU ban on snus, said that no evidence was brought against him in two recent sittings, according to a report by the Malta Independent.
Dalli’s statement was in reaction to the decision on Friday by Magistrate Caroline Farrugia Frendo that enough evidence has been brought forward for him to stand trial.
Dalli has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
“Some media in Malta must have had a schadenfreude pleasure in reporting the decision of the court that there is a prima facie case against me and therefore the compilation is to continue,” Dalli said.
“Anyone following the case objectively would know that in two sittings, not one shred of evidence has been brought against me. It must be said that it was my choice not to move for the prima facie dismissal of the case. I want this hearing to go through the full process and have the opportunity to expose the machinations of the Commission and OLAF officials about this case. This should start during the next sitting. I hope that there will be no attempt to stop this through claims of immunity.”
The case dates from 2012, when Dalli’s aide Silvio Zammit allegedly tried to obtain a €60 million ($71.17 million) bribe from Swedish Match to reverse the EU ban on snus. The company rejected the offer as improper and reported it to the European Commission.
Zammit who was charged in December 2012 for trading influence and complicity in the request, passed away earlier this year.
February 22, 2022
‘Dalligate’ Aide Dies

Photo: Bits and Splits
Silvio Zammit, a key figure in the “Dalligate” snus bribery scandal, died at age 57, reports Malta Independent.
A Maltese businessman and political canvasser for former EU Health Commissioner John Dalli, Zammit allegedly tried to solicit a €60 million ($68.20 million) bribe from Swedish Match in exchange for using his influence to lift the EU ban on selling snus.
Swedish Match rejected the offer as improper and reported it to the European Commission.
The European Commission forced Dalli to quit in 2012 after the EU’s anti-fraud office uncovered the bribery attempt. Zammit was charged in December 2012 for trading influence and complicity in the request.
The case against Dalli continues. On Feb. 9, 2022, he appeared in a Maltese court charged with bribery and trading influence, according to Euractiv.
Dalli has repeatedly said that he was framed, set up by the tobacco lobby to delay his draft anti-smoking legislation.
A Maltese investigative journalist, Daphne Caruana, who made various allegations against Dalli in her blog “Running Commentary,” was murdered in October 2017.
February 17, 2022
Immunity Waiver Clears Path for Dalli Trial

Photo: Kirill Ryzhov
The European Commission waived John Dalli’s immunity from prosecution, allowing the court case against him to begin, reports The Independent.
“The commission can confirm that, on the request of the attorney general of Malta, the commission has waived the immunity of former Commissioner John Dalli,” a European Commission spokesperson said.
Dalli’s aide Silvio Zammit allegedly tried to obtain a €60 million ($71.17 million) bribe from Swedish Match to reverse the EU ban on snus (the company rejected the offer as improper and reported it to the European Commission). Dalli was the European commissioner for health at the time, in charge of managing reforms to the EU’s tobacco rules.
The European Commission forced Dalli to quit in 2012 due to the scandal after the EU’s anti-fraud office uncovered the bribery attempt. Zammit was charged in December 2012 for trading influence and complicity in the request.
Dalli insists the case is an orchestrated scheme created the “corrupt” media.
The case is set to begin on Dec. 21.
December 15, 2021
Dalli to Face Charges in Snus Bribery Scandal

Photo: highwaystarz
Former European Commissioner John Dalli will face charges as part of a tobacco bribery scandal that resulted in his resignation from the commission in 2012, reports the Times of Malta.
Dalli’s aide Silvio Zammit allegedly tried to obtain a €60 million ($71.17 million) bribe from Swedish Match to reverse the EU ban on snus (the company rejected the offer as improper and reported it to the European Commission). Dalli was the European commissioner for health at the time, in charge of managing reforms to the EU’s tobacco rules. Zammit was charged in December 2012 for trading influence and complicity in the request.
Dalli, however, escaped charges, returning to Malta only after the newly elected Labour government removed Police Commissioner John Rizzo from his job.
Rizzo has always maintained that Dalli, too, had a case to answer to.
His successor as police commissioner, Peter Paul Zammit, decided there was not enough proof to bring charges against the former EU commissioner.
Contacted by Times of Malta, Dalli said the charges were part of a deal struck between current Police Commissioner Angelo Gafa and former Olaf head Giovanni Kessler, who led the EU Anti-Fraud Office’s investigation in 2012.
Dalli will appear in court in Malta on Sept. 17. He said the charges were part of a “campaign” against him. “This is another fraud,” he told the Times of Malta.
In February, Dalli lost his final appeal before the EU high court against a lower court ruling that dismissed the politician’s claim for €1 million in damages stemming from his resignation over the scandal.
Denying knowledge of the bribe, Dalli claimed that he was illegally forced from his post.
September 7, 2021
Court Ordered to Reconsider Immunity in ‘Dalligate’

Photo: Csaba Deli | Dreamstime.com
Europe’s top court on June 18 sent back to a lower court a dispute over immunity in a political scandal involving Swedish smokeless tobacco and millions of dollars in bribes, reports Court House News Service.
The European Court of Justice (EJC) found that a lower court erred in its decision to side with the former head of the European Union’s anti-fraud office, Giovanni Kessler, whose immunity from prosecution had been rescinded by the European Commission following allegations of illegal wiretapping.
The case dates from 2012, when Maltese politician John Dalli either resigned from or was forced out of his post as the European commissioner for health and consumer policy following allegations of bribery.
An investigation by the EU anti-fraud office OLAF found that an associate of Dalli, Silvio Zammit had demanded €60 million ($67 million) from Swedish Match to lift a ban on snus, which is legal in Sweden but outlawed in other EU member states.
Dalli denied he had any knowledge of the bribe. He brought several complaints about his resignation controversy to the court in 2015, which he all lost.
During the OLAF probe, investigators allegedly listened in to a conversation with a witness in the investigation. The information wasn’t used in the investigation, but the actions would be a violation of Belgian wiretapping laws.
The case now returns to the General Court for another decision.
June 22, 2020
Dalligate update: Kimberley denies asking for €60 million
Defence lawyers of Sliema restaurateur Silvio Zammit yesterday pressed the police’s witness Gayle Kimberley on whether she was the one who came up with the €60 million figure at the heart of the Dalligate scandal.
Kimberley denied it categorically, but lawyer Edward Gatt insisted on the point, reminding the young lawyer that she was testifying under oath, according to a story in The Malta Times.
He then went back to a note that Kimberley had prepared for Zammit with a series of questions for the former European Commissioner John Dalli and asked why she had written down that Swedish Match made a turnover of €500 million, half of which was profit.
She said that the figure was suggested by Swedish Match, adding that the intention was to relay the message to Dalli that the company was actually a modest trader in the tobacco industry.
However, at this point, Dr Gatt and his colleague Kris Busietta pressed further saying that she had mentioned that figure because she was later going to ask for €50 million to lift the ban through her contacts with Dalli. She later suggested changing it to €60 million “so it would not be a round figure”, according to the lawyer.
Kimberley also rejected this but the lawyer again reminded her that she was testifying under oath, adding that she had plans to use the money to set up a lobbying office in Brussels and buy property in Sliema with her former lover Iosif Galea. Kimberley also denied this.
Shortly after this, Gatt stopped the cross-examination, saying he would continue at a later date because he needed time to review a lot of material, which the defence was analyzing, suggesting that they had material which was not available to the police or OLAF. Earlier, in fact, Gatt pointed out that Kimberley sent most of her emails through her phone. Nonetheless, when asked she said that neither OLAF nor the police had seized her phone, despite seizing her work and home computers.
May 9, 2013