The Nationalist Party has lost a court case it had opened against the State Advocate to try and force him to recover the money that had been defrauded from the Vitals-Steward hospitals deal.

Judge Toni Abela said that it wasn’t up to the courts to instruct the State Advocate.

PN leader Bernard Grech and MP Adrian Delia had opened the case as a follow-up to Delia’s landmark court victory, where the Vitals-Steward deal was declared as fraudulent. As a result of the sentence, the government re-nationalised the St Luke’s, Karin Grech, and Gozo General Hospitals.

The PN said the State Advocate was duty-bound to recover the “€400 million” the state had lost as a result of the deal without waiting for instructions from the government, which has contested the multi-million figure.

However, State Advocate Chris Soler accused the PN politicians of trying to mislead the court to score political points.