Prime Minister Robert Abela said Friday that the magisterial inquiry into the death of Jean Paul Sofia has been concluded and the report has been submitted to the Attorney General.
Addressing the media, Abela said that he will be requesting a copy of the report from the AG and, as promised, he will be publishing it in its entirety. He said that there is an over-arching public interest in the case and he felt compelled to publish it without any redactions.
Sofia, aged 20, died when a building under construction in Kordin collapsed on 3 December, 2022.
Abela said that the public inquiry which he announced last Monday – after the government had voted against the idea four days before – will be set up in the coming days. The terms of reference for the public inquiry will be based on the findings of the magisterial inquiry.
The conclusion of the inquiry comes four days after Abela announced the setting up of a public inquiry into the tragedy, citing an entension requested by Magistrate Marse-Ann Farrugia as one of the reasons behind the development. The Prime Minister’s U-turn on a public inquiry – which he had resisted for seven months – came just hours before thousands gathered for a vigil in remembrance of Jean Paul Sofia which his family organised in Valletta.
He said that the magistrate had 60 days to conclude the inquiry, but this was extended six times to last more than seven months. He said that this is a simple computation, given that seven months have passed since the tragic accident took place. He refuted the idea that someone had given him information he should not have had, pointing fingers at present and former Nationalist MPs who seemed to relish giving information about magisterial inquiries that should be confidential.
Now that the inquiry has been concluded and passed on to the AG, he expected the AG and the police to see what next steps need to be taken.
What has happened is what he wished for from the beginning, he said, that the magisterial inquiry is concluded before any other steps are taken. He said that what he has always been after is full justice. All those responsible will need to shoulder their responsibility, he said. He said he had initially not wanted the public inquiry to interfere with the ongoing magisterial inquiry.
Abela said that if the parliamentary vote on the Opposition’s motion calling for a public inquiry had been taken after the conclusion of the magisterial inquiry, then the government’s vote would have been different.