At the age of 93, President Robert Mugabe was finally forced to step down by Zimbabwe’s military. He became prime minister in 1980 and president in 1987. And just stayed there. He just wouldn’t go away.
Here in Malta, we also have somebody who won’t go away. Joe Debono Grech, fast approaching the ripe old age of 85, has just been reappointed on the board of directors of Gozo Channel Ltd by Gozo Minister Clint Camilleri.
Camilleri owed Debono Grech big time. The former Labour minister who served under three prime ministers ‒ Dom Mintoff, Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici and Alfred Sant ‒ vociferously endorsed Camilleri’s candidacy before the 2022 election. In his inimitable coarse style, Debono Grech compared Labour to the good thief. He brazenly admitted Labour is corrupt but that “at least we gained something out of our [Labour’s] corruption”.
Journalists asked Robert Abela at the time “Are you the good thief or the bad thief?” “I’m no thief” the prime minister replied. He condemned Debono Grech for his biblical allegory and for publicly admitting Labour’s corruption. Abela declared: “This is why the PL renewed itself ‒ to eliminate such language”.
Abela’s criticism of Debono Grech’s honest admission was just false. Abela took no action against Debono Grech. Instead, he rewarded him with another plum job. Abela reappointed the octagenarian “special delegate of the prime minister” and paid him €40,000 per annum. Debono Grech is meant to work full-time, at the age of 84, for his €40,000. But he has no office space and no duties.
His €40,000 job is another phantom job like Rosianne Cutajar’s. How right she was when she messaged “everybody is pigging out”. If the NAO conducted an investigation into Debono Grech’s prime minister delegate job, they’d leave empty handed. I suspect there’d be nothing to show for his lucrative pay cheque.
Abela is paying Debono Grech €40,000 taxpayers’ money for nothing. Debono Grech also gets a fully expensed car and a mobile phone allowance of over €800. Besides, he’s cashing in his two-thirds pension, an additional €32,000 ministerial pension and his remuneration for his role as Gozo Channel director.
Times of Malta sent the Gozo minister questions about Debono Grech’s comments at his Xewkija campaign event. Camilleri simply ignored them. He didn’t bother answering. This is the same minister who called journalists “a bunch of imbeciles”.
Camilleri knows that the 84-year-old Debono Grech is hardly the best person to sit on Gozo Channel’s board. He’s abused his position by jumping the queue with his family to get onto the ferry.
Abela knows Debono Grech should not be the prime minister’s special delegate ‒ because Debono Grech shares more with Mugabe than just his penchant for corruption. The two shared an authoritarian nature, scathing disdain for adversaries and a tendency for violent intimidation.
“Do you want me to punch you to the floor to realise I’m still here,” Mugabe once told a journalist enquiring about his retirement plans. On the campaign trail he commented to another, “You see this fist, it can smash your face”.
Similarly, Debono Grech threatened his parliamentary colleague Marlene Farrugia, “I’ll come and smash you”.
When Mintoff brought down Alfred Sant’s government, costing Debono Grech his transport ministry, Debono Grech allegedly attempted to assault Mintoff. He also faced prosecution for allegedly threatening a police officer. For his efforts, Debono Grech was awarded the National Order of Merit (Ġieħ ir-Repubblika).
At least, Mugabe was elegant, eloquent and well-educated. At least, he was finally pushed out by his own generals in 2017 ‒ 47 years after taking power.
It helps Labour transmit their clear message that if you’re on the PL side, you will be rewarded
Debono Grech still hangs on, almost 60 years after first making it to parliament in 1966. He’s still milking the system, providing rousing endorsements for the very candidates he knows will reward him. He’s still cashing in from Abela’s fake job.
Before Mugabe was elected prime minister, he’d been to Malta to attend the 1978 conference with UK Foreign Secretary David Owen, America’s UN Ambassador Andrew Young and Mugabe’s rival Joshua Nkomo. They were hosted by Mintoff in Castille. Debono Grech was already there waiting in the wings, soon to be made minister of parastatal and people’s investments.
Mugabe died in 2019, leaving behind him a bankrupt country riven with violent intimidation and robbed of its democracy.
The announcement that Mugabe had resigned triggered wild celebrations in the streets of Zimbabwe. Cars honked and people danced and sang.
But Debono Grech is still going - prime minister’s special delegate, Gozo channel board director, and Clint Camilleri’s personal propagandist.
Rosianne Cutajar’s phantom ITS post was not a one-off. Labour uses fake directorships and phantom special delegate positions simply to repay its loyalists, to buy their support or to stave off rebellion, using taxpayers’ money. Labour simply makes up completely unnecessary fake jobs.
Instead of appointing the best people through a transparent competitive process, Labour simply hand-picks its most unsuitable Labour buddies ‒ some well past retirement age.
Debono Grech, Edward Scicluna, Albert Marshall, Joe Mizzi, Lawrence Mizzi, Charles Buhagiar, Alex Sceberras Trigona all benefit from Abela’s generosity with the taxpayers’ euros.
These are not mistakes. They are part of Labour’s political system, the core of Labour’s strategy. Labour is delighted these cases get publicity.
It helps Labour transmit their clear message to the nation that if you’re on the PL’s side, you will be rewarded, you’ll be taken care of ‒ not just in the short term but well into your 80s. The louder the criticism of Debono Grech’s obscene appointments, the greater the return for Labour, and for Clint Camilleri.
Opportunists will swarm round Camilleri ‒ because they know he’s scornful of the media, he ignores their questions, he insults journalists and doesn’t give a damn about accountability.
He’ll carry on appointing Debono Grech to whichever board he feels like. Nothing’s going to stop him.
Of course, the man enabling Camilleri’s abuse is Abela.
Robert Abela fails to rein Camilleri in ‒ not because he can’t but because that’s what Abela expects from Camilleri. Camilleri is simply following his prime minister’s example, slavishly following his instructions, loyally implementing Abela’s political system of institutionalised cronyism.
Kevin Cassar is a professor of surgery.