Academics write to data protection commissioner over Josef Caruana leaking their personal data

A person of trust at the Office of the Prime Minister and former Labour MEP candidate Josef Caruana has leaked the personal information of some academics who signed a petition calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, academics said.

The academics said that around 70 of them had their personal data leaked by the same Caruana while the petition was not yet public.

Caruana took to Facebook on Wednesday to attack the academics. "In the meantime at the University of Malta, our supposedly intellectual people are quick to reach conclusions... not in the name of the rule of law!" he wrote.

The academics in question wrote to the Data Protection Commissioner over the leak and called for steps to be taken.

More than 300 academics have signed a petition for Muscat to "resign or be removed." 

""As academics at the University of Malta we have followed developments in Malta tied to the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia, corruption and institutionalised money laundering. We feel that those entrusted with power have betrayed, in the most serious manner, the trust of Maltese citizens and the international community. In this context, Joseph Muscat must resign or be removed from office with immediate effect. This is necessary for the investigations to proceed without impediment from the Office of the Prime Minister," they wrote.

Dean of the Faculty of Social Wellbeing Andrew Azzopardi was one of those who took to Facebook to say that he would not be intimidated by anyone.

"I will keep writing, keep talking, keep signing petitions that I think should be signed... there are others who should be ashamed," Azzopardi wrote.