Mabel Strickland’s heir challenges Times of Malta’s succession

Updated 11 May 2012 with errate-corrige from Robert Hornyold-Strickland.

A shareholder of Allied Newspapers, the publishers of The Times, has alleged that his rightful claims to Mabel Strickland's estate could have been usurped from him by the executors of the newspaper's founder's will.

In his long letter surprisingly published on the Sunday Times, Robert Hornyold-Strickland hit out at the council members of the Strickland Foundation, the trust that owns 78.5% of Allied Newspapers, for eliminating him from any representation on its council.

Hornyold-Strickland, who owns Allied Newspaper's second-largest share with 13.3% of the company, is currently in court litigation with the foundation, whose chairman is Joseph Ganado - one of the executors of Mabel Strickland's will, and today a director of Allied Newspapers.

But in his letter to the newspaper, Strickland's nephew made strong allegations that her executors, the late Guido de Marco and Ganado, revised her last will, effectively preventing him from inheriting Strickland's newspaper and estate in Lija.

Describing himself as her "chosen heir", Hornyold-Strickland said he was not happy with the way the two executors - whom he did not mention by name - carried out their fiduciary duties over the past 20 years. "As a result, two extraneous families of my aunt's executors now sit on the council of the foundation, which administers her legacy, while her carefully chosen heir has been continually excluded from both organisations by the majority shareholder with no explanation to date."

Hornyold-Strickland is claiming Ganado and de Marco obtained a seat on the Strickland Foundation after revising Mabel Strickland's will in 1979, without ever showing him the contents of this revision.

Robert Hornyold-Strickland

The foundation was a trust created in 1975 to hold Mabel Strickland's majority shareholding in The Times until such time as Hornyold-Strickland, a British national, obtained his Maltese passport to be able to inherit the estate upon her death.

Strickland, a spinster, had been unable to bequeath her estate to her nephew by the Mintoff government's Foreign Interference Act, which prevented private holdings being held by non-Maltese nationals.

Foreseeing this problem, Strickland adopted her nephew in 1977. But this court decision was blocked when the government of the day adopted legislation stopping anyone other than a minor being adopted, effectively halting Hornyold-Strickland's automatic right to Maltese nationality, as an adoptee.

"To my surprise, in 1979 Mabel was seemingly persuaded to change her will again. Her legal adviser, by his own admission, helped her with drafting the new will to put it into a legal format and dictated it to her for her to write in her own hand. It was filed with a revised trust (now known as the Strickland Foundation) in August 1979 but, although still her heir, I was not shown the changed will despite my aunt instructing her legal adviser to see me in London the following month," Hornyold-Strickland wrote.

Hornyold-Strickland said that the unnamed legal adviser did not visit him in London, and that he was never given a copy of the revised will despite having always been given copies of her earlier wills.

Hornyold-Strickland claimed he only became aware of the revised will after Mabel Strickland died in 1988 and could not verify whether the revised will represented her final wishes accurately.

Both Max Ganado, the son of Prof. Joseph Ganado, and tourism and environment minister Mario de Marco, son of the late Guido de Marco, preferred not to comment on the pending court litigation being pursued by Hornyold-Strickland.

Max Ganado, who sits on the Strickland Foundation's five-person council, said he felt it was inappropriate to comment on Hornyold-Strickland's comments as it "will only complicate matters."

On his part, de Marco - another council member - referred this newspaper to Prof. Ganado. Both Max Ganado and de Marco pointed out their positions on the Strickland Foundation were without any remuneration, and that they do not hold any position in the Allied Group.

In 2010, Hornyold-Strickland filed a lawsuit against Joseph Ganado and the trust's members over the property controlled by the foundation, which includes Strickland's estate in Lija.

As recently as March 2012, the defendants' lawyer told the court that both parties are now in negotiations to reach an agreement. The case is deferred to 9 October, where it is expected that both parties reach an agreement. But if the parties fail to do so, Hornyold-Strickland will be cross-examined on the same date.

Mabel Strickland, daughter of Gerald Strickland who was Prime Minister of Malta between 1927 and 1930, founded The Times with her father in 1935.

Hornyold-Strickland has insisted she chose him as her universal heir when he was aged 21 in order to "continue the connection between the Strickland family name and her business and property interests."

Today, although owning 13% of the newspaper, Hornyold-Strickland is neither on the board of the newspaper group nor on the council of the Strickland Foundation, which is the controlling shareholder. "Instead, the board of trustees, on which the two executors have sat, appointed the two sons of the executors onto the council of the Strickland Foundation, despite no Strickland being represented there," he said.

Mabel Strickland's home in Lija and her family's sentimental possessions now belong to the Strickland Foundation and although Hornyold-Strickland has the rights of use and habitation for his lifetime, he says that "his family's life has been made difficult by the self same people who were originally chosen to protect his interests when exercising their fiduciary duties."

Hornyold-Strickland also said he had been denied access to his great-aunt's personal papers and he has taken legal action against the foundation to try to recover them.

On 11 May 2012, Robert Hornyold-Strickland wrote:

1. My legal action 34/2010/SM is only against the two executors of my aunt's estate (one of whom has since passed away) in their dual roles as both executors and representatives of the principal legatee. It concerns assets passed to the Strickland Foundation which I believe should have been rightfully passed to me as heir. For this reason, and this reason alone, I have had to join in the Strickland Foundation to this court action. My court action is not a dispute between shareholders and nor is it in any way an action against the newspaper. I wish to make this very clear.

2. My dispute does not even concern the controlling shares in Allied which admittedly I was due to inherit until my aunt's will was changed in 1979. The manner in which this change was undertaken raises many questions, especially in view of the fact that I had been banned from entering Malta in 1978 and was not able to return until nine years later.

3. I recognize that I have lost a significant part of my legacy and so am now more concerned that the Strickland family's legacy to the Maltese people is used for the purposes my Aunt originally intended and is administered as transparently as possible.

4. I believe that many of the questions I have put to the executor's and their families could have been explained by the timely release to me of my aunt's private papers - especially her instructions and correspondence in connection with the 1979 changed will. I am advised that I am the rightful owner of these papers since I am her heir. Very surprisingly access to her papers has been consistently denied to me for over 20 years.

5. Prof de Marco and Prof Ganado were due to sit on the original 1975 Trust as well as its 1979 successor (the Strickland Foundation) so your assertion that they 'obtained a seat on the Strickland Foundation after revising Mabel Strickland's Will in 1979' is untrue. In any event I understand from Prof Ganado that he was not involved in the 1979 revision of my aunt's will.

6. My aunt first nominated Prof de Marco and Prof Ganado as her two executors and me as her universal heir in 1975 and these details were reconfirmed in subsequent wills. However the proposed future ownership of two of her most important assets did change in 1979 where instead of being bequeathed to me they were now left to the Strickland Foundation.

7. Prof de Marco became her personal legal adviser in about 1975 (having previously advised the Times on an ad hoc basis). He was given her power of attorney from June 1978 onwards just after I was forced to leave Malta. After my aunt changed her will in 1979 he was acting not just as her legal adviser, holding her power of attorney but was also one of her two future executors and a representative of her future principal beneficiary.