Hate crime police are investigating the deputy mayor of Vittoriosa over a social media post in which he described a resident as a waste of sperm.

Christopher Cassar said he regretted the post and said it was not meant to be taken seriously. 

Last May, Cassar replied to an expatriate’s Facebook post questioning the disinfection of Vittoriosa streets due to COVID-19 by slamming the complainant and telling him to “f**k off”.

“Always complaining and try[ing] to make a fool of us. The only waste I see here is some sperm, done some years ago... a house here you can buy it, but you can never buy respect,” Cassar wrote, provoking a barrage of xenophobic comments such as “go back to your country” and “foreign scum”.

Cassar was due to appear in court last Thursday over charges related to the post but the case has been postponed until the end of March.

When Times of Malta asked him if he regretted, as a public official, making such inappropriate remarks, he said he did, adding “even a public official can make a mistake”.

However, he claimed the post was meant to be funny.

“In Cottonera this is how we joke with each other... these people don’t understand our sense of humour,” he said.

He said he did not know the man to whom his post was directed even though he addressed him by name.

Otherwise, he would have talked to him to straighten things out, he said.

“In a situation where everyone was locked up inside and scared and the Birgu local council was doing everything in its power to keep everyone safe, someone telling us that disinfecting the streets is a waste of money isn’t fair,” Cassar explained.

In the post he also criticised the expatriate community for treating neighbours like “idiots”, despite the Maltese always welcoming them.

This wasn’t the first time that Cassar had lashed out at foreigners and encouraged xenophobia since he has been in public office.

In a Facebook post a couple months after he was elected deputy mayor, he railed against some people, particularly a resident group called Friends of Cottonera, for dictating how the locality should be run.

“Let me make it clear, we are Cottonera, and no one will speak in our name.

“Cottonera is our children and not the people who have just come to live in it now… so while we will welcome you among us we would appreciate if you don’t interfere,” he wrote.

In other incendiary public posts, he also directed expletives at columnist Kristina Chetcuti.