Sliema council to hold emergency meeting to discuss executive secretary’s position

Sliema mayor Nikki Dimech wants to hold an urgent meeting this afternoon at 5:30pm, ostensibly to discuss whether executive secretary Svetlana Curmi should stay or go from the council.

If she goes, it will be the third executive secretary – the council’s ‘manager’ – to leave since January. The first was Josef Grech, who was removed in January 2010, and then Altea Borg was removed in May.

The Sliema Residents Association (SRA), a group of residents who flag offensive construction projects in the Nationalist stronghold, has expressed its concerns and “disdain” of the situation at the council, which is not functioning for a number of reasons going by the statements of its own councillors.

Last week, eight Sliema councillors – all but PN councillors Johanna Gonzi, Cyrus Engerer, and Julian Galea – turned up for an urgent meeting called by Dimech, which however was stopped a few hours before by Martin Bugelli, the director of local government.

Dimech said the meeting was called was to "clear the air" with executive secretary Svetlana Curmi, with whom relations do not appear to be serene. Sources say the secretary, a career civil servant who was appointed to Sliema council only two months ago, was instrumental in flagging the financial irregularities that were later sent to the IAID for investigation.

Labour councillors Martin Debono and Marianne Aquilina said they had met Curmi on Thursday to discuss how to proceed on administrative duties which had slowed down, and Curmi was reported to have said she "could not work with Dimech."

“The fact that eight of the eleven Sliema councillors including the mayor turned up for an ‘irregular’ urgent council meeting speaks volumes,” the SRA said. “We’re concerned about the apparent ‘divide’, and we’re appealing to all councillors to own up to their responsibilities and put at the top of their agenda the legitimate interest of the Sliema residents who voted them into Office.