No education minister appointed, days after Caruana’s Christmas resignation

Heading into Christmas, Malta still does not have a minister for education, days after the resignation of Justyne Caruana.

While a number of current MPs and ministers have been touted for Caruana’s job, Prime Minister Robert Abela is yet to announce who will be taking the important post.

“Not having a minister of education at a time when we should be preparing for any eventuality following the Christmas holidays does not augur well,” shadow minister for education Clyde Puli said.

“In the last four years and in such a difficult time the ministry of education has already changed leadership three times and this has resulted in a lack of stability and lack of general results. Our appeal is for the PM to appoint a competent person as soon as possible.”

On Wednesday, former education minister Justyne Caruana tendered her resignation on the back of an ethics breach in which she gifted a €15,000 contract to her partner Daniel Bogdanovic.

Standards Commissioner George Hyzler found Caruana breached ministerial ethics when she awarded a contract of service to her boyfriend Daniel Bogdanovic.

MaltaToday revealed details of the contract earlier this year. Bogdnavoic was to be paid €15,000 for just three months' work on the national sports curriculum. The contract was scrapped when the news broke to the public.

A damning report by the Standards Commissioner found that Bogdanovic was tasked to carry out a study of the sports school, a job he was unsuitable to do as he had no pedagogical training. In a contract of service running from January 2021 to 20 April 2021, Bogdanovic was to be paid €5,000 every month to visit various government schools and come up with recommendations and initiatives to improve the national school of sport’s ability to produce elite athletes.

Hyzler found that the report for which Bogdanovic was to be paid €15,000, was actually compiled by Debattista. Email logs obtained from the Malta Information Technology Agency (MITA) revealed the information. Hyzler noted that this fact was kept hidden from him when hearing testimony on the case. In the wake of Caruana’s resignation, consultant to the minister, Paul Debattista, has had his contract with the ministry terminated.

This email to Bogdanovic was sent on the same day that Debattista wrote to the permanent secretary in the education ministry, Frank Fabri, to inform him that an expert was identified for the sports school study. On Friday, civil service head Mario Cutajar told the media an internal process has been launched into whether Frank Fabri, broke any rules and if he should face disciplinary measures.

“I can confirm that I have read the report and have already called in the permanent secretary at the education ministry to get his version of events. An internal procedure is now underway to establish the facts, dig deeper and see what happened on a public service basis,” Cutajar said.

Frank Fabri had failed to respond to a series of questions by MaltaToday, including whether he should resign after the Standards Commissioner concluded that he should not have signed a contract awarded to Caruana’s close friend, Daniel Bogdanovic.

Fabri, who is the permanent secretary in the education ministry, has ignored emails, phone calls and several reminders.

On Thursday, the Union of Professional Educators (UPE) formally wrote to the Police Commissioner, asking him to investigate Justyne Caruana and Frank Fabri. “The UPE has called for the immediate resignation of the Permanent Secretary Frank Fabri. This follows his reported role in signing off on the arrangement with Daniel Bogdanovic,” UPE Executive Head Graham Sansone said.