Former Acting Police Commissioner Raymond Zammit has been given a financial package of more than €60,000 annually by the Ministry of Justice and Local Councils in his new job as CEO of the local enforcement agency.
Handpicked by Justice Minister Owen Bonnici a few weeks after retiring from the police force, Mr Zammit has been made responsible for the newly created agency which will take over the work previously done by local councils.
After two months of questions and reminders asking for information about Mr Zammit’s financial package, a spokeswoman for Minister Bonnici said he would receive an annual salary of €52,500.
She said that Mr Zammit was also entitled to an annual expense allowance of €2,000, a car allowance of €4,659 and a telephone allowance of €815, as well as to a performance bonus. However, the ministry did not divulge what percentage of Mr Zammit’s pay would be pegged to his performance bonus.
Dr Bonnici could not find any reason to preclude him from heading the local enforcement agency
Normally, such a bonus would amount to over 10 per cent of the basic salary, which would net over €5,000 a year extra in the case of Mr Zammit.
The former acting commissioner and his two sons have been making the news for the past year. After being made head of the police force in 2014, Mr Zammit was forced out of the job by the Prime Minister just six months after his appointment for acting in a “grossly unprofessional” manner in the case of the shooting incident involving former minister Manuel Mallia’s driver.
Another inquiry a few months later, this time over possible improper conduct, concluded that Mr Zammit and his two sons, Daniel and Roderick, had been involved in business relations against police rules.
When he was a senior police officer, Ray Zammit was in business with the Gaffarena family. His son Daniel also “acted unethically” in a 2008 murder investigation involving a relative of the Gaffaranas with whom the Zammits did business. Despite these findings, Home Affairs Minister Owen Bonnici defended the appointment.
According to the minister, Mr Zammit was given a warning following the second inquiry but he could not find any reason to preclude him from heading the local enforcement agency. Dr Bonnici categorically denied suggestions that the government had any obligations to Mr Zammit.