Simon Cusens has sent me a right of reply with regard to my article about him and it basically confirms what I wrote: that he sold his family’s company to Ivan Vassallo who then proceeded to sell it to Vitals. Simon Cusens insists he did nothing illicit or wrong. He was very disappointed for having his identity revealed after he gave an interview to the state broadcaster on freemasonry with his face covered. TVM is showing a feature which normalises Simon Cusens’ club of freemasons simply by reproducing his version of the story into a sensationalist documentary. Obviously, there is no journalism involved in this documentary. The show is very clearly intended to portray the freemasons as a legitimate and charitable organisation.
Simon Cusens is trying to normalise freemasonry by saying that his group does not do anything illegal and that it’s only a club for men who do charity. He was frustrated for having been compared to other freemasonry groups who are outright criminal organisations, like the freemasonry club previously run by David Gatt, the notorious criminal lawyer who was also a police officer (he didn’t mention his name specifically). He also said that he never did anything wrong or illicit in his business deals.
Apparently, Simon Cusens is on a mission to tell us there is nothing wrong with freemasonry clubs.
Simon Cusens is not being honest about freemasonry and his club and if he never wanted any bad press, he should have never put himself into the public foray to promote a practice which for many years has been condemned by conventional politics. Freemasonry clubs are not charitable organisations, on the contrary, they are self-serving organisations. Men who join freemasonry clubs do so to join a group that can extend their contacts and businesses, and charity is a cover for this network. This networking in these secret groups also leads to deals with public officials and rent-seeking. For example, Simon Cusens has a club of freemasons that has as members, government directors and Labour Party affiliates and these directors are hiding the fact they belong to his club. In addition, supposedly, members of a freemason club can’t be members of the Labour Party but the Labour Party doesn’t care about this rule any more.
The rich and ultra-rich don’t join these clubs unless they are involved in illegal or criminal activity. When you are rich and you want to do charity, you don’t join a club of men who wear ridiculous catering-like vests in dumb spiritual rituals, but you simply choose your favorite charity and donate money. Ever since Labour took power in 2013, Malta had a boom in freemasonry and many people joined such clubs, including failed business people looking for help or even teachers looking for a change of career. The practice of freemasonry also serves to add a layer to criminal activity, for example by potentially legitimising insider trading and government corruption. A government director in a freemason club may for example be prone to give public contracts to his fellow members.
What Simon Cusens is doing is outright wrong, no matter how he is whitewashing it.
Simon Cusens’ right of reply.
In terms of the Media & Defamation Act, your client is being requested to publish the following as a right of reply giving the same prominence as was done with the relative blog post. The right of reply is to be posted immediately beneath the relative blog post.
‘i am not involved in the medical equipment business and have not been involved in the medical business since my family and another family both sold their shareholding prior to May 2017.
I sold my business to a Maltese company which isn’t mentioned in your article and consequently I was never connected to dealings that the acquiring company may have had or may have subsequently or allegedly entered into after the sale.
I have never had any business dealings with Ivan Vassallo who was an employee at my workplace right until my last day of work there in April 2017, nor with any of the other persons you mention and in any shape of form.’
My client reserves his right at law to file legal procedings for libel in the event that his right of reply is not published to the letter & in full.
For your client to be guided accordingly.
Avv Kris Busietta
It begs the question: if there’s nothing shady about it, why the secrecy?
If the person he sold it to, proceeded to re sell it, how does that involve Mr Cusens?…. I don’t get it. The person he sold it to us the guilty party, in my eyes.
Mark, what’s your beef exactly? Freemasonry, or the fact that Mr Cusens sold on a company when he had no knowledge what was going to happen and had no responsibility to do so? He sent the right of reply and you’re using it to attack even further. Seek your revenge (as you yourself said) against the party and government that didn’t give you what you wanted.
I find it odd that the company Cusens sold ends up in the hands of one of his former employees. We need to know more about the company Cusens sold his business to. It’s just possible that this was a form of ‘layering’, similar to the tricks money-launderers use to cover their tracks. Didn’t something similar happen with that Montenegro wind farm?
Why the secrecy? What is secret are the members, everything else is available online. If you want to chat pointlessly and assume the role of sheep, look at a social media platform and eat your heart out! They are doing nothing wrong and if you have strong evidence to the contrary, go ahead, go the authorities with it!