Former Labour CEO Randolph Debattista is to serve as editor to the party’s new English-language portal.
His new role at the helm of The Journal comes just over one year after he was sacked as party CEO by Prime Minister Robert Abela, shortly after Abela assumed office.
The Journal, which is still not operational, was revealed by the party's president Ramona Attard last week. The Labour Party already operates a Maltese-language portal, One News.
Debattista has a long history within the Labour Party, having started his career as a journalist with its Maltese-language newspaper Kulħadd before moving on to work with the party’s communications team between 2011 and 2013.
He was moved into the civil service following the party’s rise to power in 2013 and served as deputy chief of staff and then chef de cabinet at Malta’s permanent representation to the EU until 2017, when he returned to Malta to serve as the Labour Party’s CEO, replacing Gino Cauchi.
His time as CEO ended turbulently as he distanced himself from former OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri and others within the party, writing in December 2019 that “criminals do not belong inside Labour”.
As the race to elect a successor to disgraced prime minister Joseph Muscat heated up, Debattista appeared to distance himself from Abela’s candidacy, dismissing a vote tampering claim filed by Abela as “not possible”.
Abela went on to beat Chris Fearne in that race to become prime minister, and sacked Debattista as party CEO weeks later.
But Debattista has now returned to the party fold, in a post first dreamt up by Abela’s leadership race rival, Fearne.
During that leadership race, Fearne had floated the idea of the Labour Party resurrecting its English-language media portal.
“We need an English version of our online portal, so that people abroad can read our version of events and not just English language newspapers with an agenda against us,” Fearne had argued.
The Journal is the Labour Party’s second attempt at an English-language news site. Its first such site, MaltaStar, was quietly wound down in 2017 following years of dwindling activity.