Education minister's €5,000-a-month sports contract has been terminated, PM says

A €5,000-a-month sports contract awarded by the Education Ministry to footballer Daniel Bogdanovic has been terminated, according to Prime Minister Robert Abela.

During a political activity on Sunday, Abela said that the contract was terminated as soon as the news broke in the media. 

MaltaToday was first to reveal last Sunday that Bogdanovic, a close friend to education minister Justyne Caruana, earned a lucrative €15,000 contract in the same ministry to work on a national sports curriculum over a three month period, despite the footballer holding no pedagogical qualifications.

On 23 March, two days after the story was published, Caruana was admitted to hospital after taking an accidental overdose of tranquiliser pills. According to a government statement, she was held for observation although her condition was stable.

This set the ball rolling for a discussion on whether the private lives of politicians should be reported and how.

On the topic, Abela said that while journalists should be responsible in their reporting, politicians should be subject to a high level of scrutiny given their powerful positions.

"I always believed in the principle that, as politicians, there is an acceptable high level of scrutiny on us - I believe that that's how it should be, even on our personal lives. At the end of the day, people have to judge us holistically in our public lives, and our private lives could affect the other," he said.