Being Frank

I took some time off to work on my book, but really the local political situation just drags me back to the office. 

It transpires that Richard Cachia Caruana is still an ambassador and it was pointed out to us that he is offering his services for free.

What the Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi avoided clarifying is whether RCC chose not to accept some kind of remuneration because it would effectively reflect on his golden handshake. A handsome sum which he receives for having had to resign after a parliamentary motion against him.

An 'ambassador to nowhere' is how JPO described it to MaltaToday.

But please do not be too shocked by Richard Cachia Caruana's interest in status and money. Everyone else seems to be driven by this thirst for more money, so why should poor Richard be the odd one out?

And by everyone I mean everyone.

I had a feeling there was something fishy when Dominic Azzopardi, the pilots' representative and Rottweiler, stopped pestering me with stories about Air Malta. 

We learnt from a leaked story in The Times (good for them for having so many links to government funded companies and agencies), that there was a deal struck between the pilots and Air Malta.

Now let us go back a little bit and remember what Dominic Azzopardi had to say.

To start with, he suggested that the salaries offered to Davies and Saunders and others were far too high. Well, he is bloody right. The salaries Davies and others take at Air Malta are ludicrous compared to what most Maltese earn and declare.

He argued that MIA was billing Air Malta far too much.

He argued that Air Malta gave its crown jewels away by giving away duty free shopping for a pittance.

He argued that Air Malta's cargo could be profitable but it was not.

He argued that there was wastage.

He argued over so many things that it was difficult to catch up with many of his observations.

For questioning Davies's salary I was presented with a letter from Air Malta's lawyer, who happened to be Andrew Borg Cardona, that they would stop advertising for having taken such an editorial stance.

The letter and threat was later withdrawn but only after I pointed out to Borg Cardona that Air Malta in fact owed us money for adverts placed in our media.

In that gruff bulldog like voice Borg Cardona replied that he did not know.

I recall telling him, well next time he should check his facts.

But never mind, I am very used to being boycotted by governments and their agencies.

One need only ask the PM's personal assistant Edgar Galea Curmi about how government organises boycotts against certain media.

Dominic Azzopardi went on to say that Air Malta was robbed by the same coterie of people. He even suggested the work of freemasonry and went through great mental gymnastics to prove his point.

Azzopardi is a colourful figure, so we offered him the space to vent his anger.

He went on to declare war on everything in his path and we gave him more space and more space. I cannot say that I do not concur with his assessment of how contracts are dished out and the way Air Malta was milked by the same group of people, BUT... and a big but....  when he sat down to talk to Air Malta about the salaries of pilots, we were told nothing. Un bel niente.

He was of course too ashamed to show that he too was interested in his pound of flesh. Dominic Azzopardi and the pilots did what all good people of this world do, they think about themselves. After all, it is not their money.

The moral of this story, is that people like Dominic Azzopardi do not really give a flying f*** about Air Malta. The ones that have not left, are still in Malta because it pays them more to stay.

I laughed, I have to say, listening to Joshua Zammit - a senior executive at Air Malta - lauding the idea of freezing the minimum wage when he spoke very recently as a representative of the Malta Employers' Association. 

Zammit chose not to divulge why his wage, running into a six-digit figure, is not fixed and static. I am sure his contract with Air Malta has a number of clauses which allow him to have incremental changes in his wage.

Life goes on, as it goes on for individuals such as Frank Portelli, the former PN member of parliament who owes hundreds of thousands of euros to dozens of people.  He was until a few months ago the most vocal personality imaginable: voicing his opinion about transparency, the Whistleblower's Act and a number of other issues... most of which were based on fantastic allegations which he kept referring to but which he could never prove.

He delighted us with his criticism of the Nationalist administration but then of late he suddenly lost his interest in flogging the PN. The rumour was that he was negotiating the sale of St Philip's Hospital to government. Well as everyone knows, the offer made by government is now out and it is abundantly clear that the deal is primarily motivated by a simple consideration: to haul Frank Portelli out of his self-made mess.

It would be so nice, if all of us had the support and concern of the government when we are eyeballs-deep in the proverbial shit. It is not only a question of perception but the fact that €12 million euros would be better spent on our State hospital.

In recent years, the plethora of Frank Portelli declarations would make you think that he is a crusader for the common good. In truth he was simply making himself a bloody nuisance to make himself a valuable nuisance.

I have to admit that I was naïve enough to believe in his sincerity. It is abundantly clear that he was taking us for a ride.

Many other declarations that have been made by several public figures may be true. Dominic Azzopardi, Frank Portelli, Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, Franco Debono and so many others have said so many credible things, but most of them have conveniently avoided the writing on the wall.

JPO for example may be right in accusing RCC of having used him and of being the eminence grise behind so many dirty campaigns. But he cannot avoid the fact that in the Mistra saga he was economical with the truth and did not give a true version of facts. And he cannot avoid being accused of creating a diversion to the embarrassing issue of Mistra.

Before 2008 everyone thought that he was being persecuted, so much so that he was elected in two districts. 

Franco Debono is also to be commended for his stand on so many issues, namely Constitutional reform, party political financing and electoral reform. He is also very amusing and daring.  His latest madness was to calling Gonzi 'Malta's Hitler': a far-fetched accusation that was quickly retracted. Here is someone who should know something about libel laws (some weeks ago he was calling for stiffer penalties and controls on bloggers).

But it is more than clear that many of his concerns stem from the lack of inclusion in a Gonzi cabinet and the fact that he is not trusted by Lawrence Gonzi.

And that sentiment is rather widespread.  Many people may agree with what Franco Debono has been saying, but on the other hand find the root of his dissident tone unacceptable.

But if you find Maltese institutions and society in general in a state of serious state of rot, then surely the decision by freemason and magistrate Carol Peralta is proof of the state of decay.

A certain Alan Gauci, who is 36 and from Mellieha, was let off the hook by Magistrate Carol Peralta after admitting to causing permanent disability to an Australian tourist in 2004. In the incident, Gauci deliberately ran his victim over in a car at 4am, after being called "gay" by the tourist.

Peralta noted in the ruling that since the insinuation that he was gay happened in Mellieha, and before fellow villagers. He ruled that "even if there is nothing wrong with that, perhaps in the accused's psyche and that of the other villagers, [the insult] was not acceptable." Apart from being a thoughtless and foolish decision, it also proves to what extent Peralta is not fit to be magistrate. The very fact that he is a freemason is in itself good reason to doubt his ability to judge fairly. But more so, this decision also transcends the whole understanding of what justice is all about. If I had to run over all the people who have accused me of being a bloody pouf, I would really need a bulldozer. I have counted over a hundred individuals who think that I am a classical pouf... and that does not include the whole hunting and trapping fraternity and the Norman Lowell clan, and all those who have been referred to in my column.

Peralta pictures Mellieha as some kind of Sicilian community inhabited by men of honour who are unwilling to stand by and take any form of offence. Perhaps Peralta's bizarre thinking is a reflection of how deep the rot has spread in this little society of ours.