The Malta Union of Teachers yesterday welcomed its new and youngest president ever, 34-year-old primary school teacher Kevin Bonello.
Mr Bonello was the only contestant for the president’s post, and could be elected only if he gained 200 votes. As it turned out he was elected by a 1,184 votes from 1,276.
Former MUT president John Bencini intends to continue working within the Forum Unions Maltin and intends to remain active in the MUT, however he plans on taking a backseat.
Mr Bonello told The Malta Independent that he intends to continue building on the foundations laid by previous MUT presidents, who left a patrimony in terms of personal and trade unionism achievements.
“The new council including myself are hoping to increase members’ accessibility to make them feel comfortable and most importantly part of the union,” he said. “We already started working on gathering the teachers’ feedback on the new curriculum collected via e-mail,” he explained, there are a lot of things that need to be considered in order to have an informed position based not on just our opinions but also on the opinion of all members.
The new MUT council is one of the youngest in the union’s history, he added, “but we have some very valid people in the education sector. We will try our best to deliver,” he continued.
20 other members of the MUT were elected council members for the term 2011 till 2014.
During the first council meeting yesterday other officials were elected according to the provisions of the MUT statute, namely senior vice-president Marco Bonnici, vice-president Karl Wright, Giorgio Debono Treasurer, international secretary Anthony Casaru, public relations officer Rita Catania, assistant general secretary Tracy Spiteri Staines and organiser David Rossi.
The other council members are Maria Concetta Abdilla, Louis Borg, MaryRose Cefai, Randall Cilia, Ted Darmanin, Carmen Dimech, Raimonda Decesare, Janice Formosa Pace, Elaine Germani, Norman Grech, Mary Carmen Housley, Chris Randon and James Sultana.
While welcoming the new councillors, the MUT council thanked the MUT elections board for its sterling work in conducting the elections.