Soldiers receive backdated promotions on eve of election

With a day to go until the general election, the government has handed out backdated promotions to 14 soldiers in the Armed Forces of Malta.

They come in the wake of nine other soldiers who received promotions on Thursday.

The AFM has said that the backdated promotions are the result of an investigation by a board that the home affairs ministry had set up to investigate claims of injustices in promotions at the armed forces.

However, PN MP and candidate Jason Azzopardi has lambasted it as a desperate move by the government to secure votes ahead of the election.

“No low is low enough for these desperate cronies,” he said on Facebook. “Not even [former Labour PM] Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici had stooped so low in 1987.”

Reports that the Labour government is handing out to last-minute favours to people in an attempt to secure votes have been circulating around the media.

Newsbook reported that Wasteserv has employed 87 new waste sorters in the past two days, while 60 new people have been hired at the health ministry.

Journalist Matthew Caruana Galizia also published an email that Air Malta sent out an email to all its staff today, announcing that Captain Bruce Pace has been appointed chief pilot.

However, a spokesperson for Air Malta told MaltaToday that this was no promotion and that Pace had been selected as chief pilot weeks ago following a call for applications.