Parliament pays tribute to former Labour minister Joe Grima

Malta’s Parliament tonight paid tribute to former Labour minister and braodcaster Joe Grima, who died earlier this month on the eve of his 81st birthday.

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat described Grima as an “eclectic, controversial and opinionated” person who never shied away from expressing himself and who made people stand up and listen.

Indeed, he said that a speech by Grima during a mass meeting in Mellieha had helped pique his own interest in politics.

Muscat also hailed Grima’s broadcasting nous, stating that people didn’t only tune in to his shows to hear his interview subjects but also to listen to his own personal views.

He also recounted how he had been the first tourism minister who took it upon himself to act as a “salesman” for Malta, personally travelling overseas to promote the island as a tourist destination.

“He was one of the first people who realized the market potential of Silvio Berlusconi’s TV stations in Italy, and indeed Malta was one of the first institutional sponsors of those programmes.”

PN deputy leader Mario de Marco noted how Grima had hosted a show on Net for seven years at a time when public debate was rife on whether Malta should join the EU.

“Grima believed that Malta should join the EU, and he should serve as an example that politicians should not always toe the party line come what may but be willing to change tack if the other side adopts stances they agree with.”

Grima was appointed industry and commerce ministry in 1981. He then became tourism minister in 1983 under Dom Mintoff and later Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici, and in the last years had served as Malta's representative to the World Tourism Organisation. He resigned from the post last year, after claiming on Facebook that London mayor Sadiq Khan – the city’s first Muslim mayor –would bring in “cockroaches” to London, a reference to Islamist extremists.