The government announced last week that Joe Debono Grech, MP, has been appointed consultant to the Gozo Minister.

Now I know, like everybody else, that Mr Debono Grech, I believe through family connections, spends a lot of time in Gozo and so is conversant with the situation in Gozo.

I also believe that there is a lot to be said for enforcing time-keeping etc across all government bodies where abuse seems to be the order of the day.

The government and the Minister for Gozo in particular, may have thought that Mr Debono Grech’s special method of running the show, confrontational, hands-on, etc are what the doctor ordered and will expect him to deliver results.

This is how he has always been and I do not think he is about to change his methods now.

But I can look back at an episode that took place in 1998 and before where Mr Debono Grech’s characteristic virulence brought about results that resulted to be directly opposite to his intentions.

In the Sant government, Joe Debono Grech, formerly Minister for Agriculture, was responsible, among other things for the as yet unprivatised airport. In the course of his duties, Mr Debono Grech was all over the airport, checking anything and everything, a very much hands-on minister, tackling issues head-on, and pushing the airport board to take decisions.

Some of these decisions impacted on people. Come September 1998 and a change in government and some of these decisions were reversed by the new administration.

A case in point regarded a person who had been removed from his post and given a sinecure on the basis, it seemed, of accusations of sexual harassment levelled against him.

Prompted by one of Mr Debono Grech’s friends, I raised the issue on the paper I was editing at that time. This person promptly sued.

I thought, nay I expected, that the case against this person would be substantiated at least by Mr Debono Grech who seemed to have had a key role in the decision leading to the ‘punishment’ meted.

Our lawyer thus put him on the list of witnesses but Mr Debono Grech never turned up. Meanwhile, in Parliament, he many times referred to the situation at the airport and attacked this person in not so many words. Yet he never turned up in court.

One day, as I was walking down Republic Street, I bumped into him, or rather he came up to me and told me in that gruff voice of his: “Don’t you think I will be coming to court.”

We tried another tack. Apparently, the charge of sexual harassment came from some women employees at the airport. We were leaked a name and summoned the person. It turned out to be a really well-turned out person. She admitted going to ‘Joe’s’ house (as she called him) and said she had talked to him about this and that but she never admitted speaking about sexual harassment and about this person.

We were lost, our case was undone. We then settled with this person for the sum of Lm1,000. So thanks in part to Mr Debono Grech not turning up to testify and / or his amnesia, this person, a PN supporter, obtained a cool Lm1000.

But, you know what? We did not pay those Lm1000. Thanks to the workings of Providence, we got those Lm1000 from none else that Alfred Sant’s and Joe Debono Grech’s Labour Party. How that was done cannot be revealed yet, but rest assured that neither Dr Sant nor Mr Debono Grech had any idea they were forking out money that were going to a PN supporter. But that was the way it happened.

I hope the intervening years have mellowed Mr Debono Grech and he looks first before he shoots. I doubt he has changed much though, and, on second thoughts, he would be of little use to Minister Refalo if he has changed that much.

In time, we found out more about that sole witness. She had more trouble to cope with and besides it looked very much like she and her friends were putting pressure on the minister to get rid of the Nationalist supporters that were in their way.

Seems like yesterday. And it also seems like today. Maybe, (I know I am weakening my argument, but then fair’s fair) something like this happened with roles reversed in PN times. Malta is a skein of personal stories jumbled up and mixed up with politicians being the villain at all times.

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