Left: Former Cambridge Analytica CEO Alexander Nix, Right: Prime Minister Joseph Muscat

A British parliamentary committee has said it has confidential information that Joseph Muscat met up with data mining firm SCL before his election as Malta’s Prime Minister and that the Labour Party had dealings with the company for “several years” before the 2013 election.

The British Parliament’s Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee today published its final report into how Facebook was used by the likes of Russia to spread disinformation and fake news and therefore manipulate elections.

At the centre of this report is the now-defunct SCL Group, which gained notoriety in recent years through its subsidiary Cambridge Analytica, after it was found to have used people’s Facebook data to profile them and micro-target them with political adverts in favour of Donald Trump and the Brexit campaign.

Last year, former PN secretary general Paul Borg Olivier confirmed that Cambridge Analytica’s CEO Alexander Nix had approached him with an offer related to the targeting of voters through behavioural dynamics a few months before the 2013 election. Borg Olivier said he had instantly turned down Nix’s offer because he had never heard of the company, and because the timing of the offer – so soon before the election – seemed suspicious.

Meanwhile, the Labour Party has vehemently denied having had any contact whatsoever with Nix, SCL or any of its subsidiary companies.

Former PN Secretary General Paul Borg Olivier

However, the House of Commons select committee said in a draft report a few months ago that it has “evidence” showing SCL had in fact been advising the Labour Party for several years before the 2013 election. The evidence also allegedly shows that Henley & Partners CEO Christian Kalin actually contacted SCL to set up a meeting with then Opposition Leader Joseph Muscat back in June 2011, something blogger-activist Manuel Delia said he has email evidence to prove.

Following the publication of this initial report, the High Commissioner of Malta to the UK and the PR company Chelgate, on behalf of the government, wrote to the committee to deny its claims.

“It is unfortunate that a report by a UK House of Commons Committee in to ‘fake news’ has fallen victim itself to purveyors of unsubstantiated rumours and speculation,” it said.

However, in its final report, the committee said it is sticking to its original version of events.

“We understand that SCL certainly had meetings in Malta, that Christian Kalin of Henley & Partners was introduced by SCL to Joseph Muscat in 2011, and that Christian Kalin met with both political parties before 2013,” it wrote.

This comment includes a footnote which states that is basing this statement on confidential information shown to the committee.

The Maltese government reacted by warning that the select committee had damaged its own credibility when it chose to base its claim on unnamed sources.

“The Committee, at no stage, supported its allegations by any evidence, nor did it afford the Maltese authorities the opportunity to respond,” the government wrote. “On the contrary, willingly and wilfully, it disregarded representations made by the Maltese authorities in writing; thus, failing to comply with usual procedures of inviting the stakeholder involved to respond to the allegations made.”

“The important work that the Select Committee has been doing by investigating such an important subject was severely undermined by allowing itself to propagate misinformation on a European State by anonymous sources.”

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Tim Diacono

Tim is interested in the rapid evolution of human society and is passionate about justice, human rights and cutting-edge political debates. You can follow him on Instagram or Twitter/X at @timdiacono or reach out to him at [email protected]