It is a concerning situation indeed when members of the disciplined forces blatantly and knowingly break their own code of conduct, when the very people who are tasked with maintaining law and order disregard the rules of their employment and codes of ethics in the interest of personal gain and with apparent impunity.

While it would be patently unfair to tar all members of the police corps and the armed forces with the same brush, it cannot be denied that both the police and army have a serious situation on their hands.

The rules we are speaking of at present are those governing the appropriateness, or otherwise, of soldiers and police officers being engaged by the state while, at the same time, they hold business interests in the ‘outside world’.

The fact that members of the police corps and the army have been shareholders in private business concerns while also holding official positions within the disciplined forces and without getting the necessary clearance from their superiors has been an open secret for several years, and the practice did not, by any stretch of the imagination, begin with this legislature.

The practice has been ongoing for several years - in clear flagrance of the codes of ethics governing both forces, and also the public service management code.

But after years of the powers that be having turned a blind to this situation, matters came to a head last year with the publication of the wheeling and dealing of former acting police commissioner Ray Zammit and his two police officer sons.

Articles by Malta Independent columnist Daphne Caruana Galizia and other reports by this newsroom last year had uncovered the Zammit family’s many dubious illicit dealings.  In actual fact, it transpired that Mr Zammit, his wife and two sons all had shareholdings in business interests with the now-infamous Gaffarena family, at a time when one of the sons was actually involved in the investigation of a murder within the same Gaffarena family.

Now if there had ever been a case of a conflict of interest between police duty and private business interests, this was it.  An inquiry was ordered by the Prime Minister, headed by Judge Michael Mallia, which found that Daniel Zammit, the son investigating the murder, had not behaved ethically and in conformity with the procedures which regulated his position during the murder investigation.  It also found that, because of their unauthorised business dealings, his brother Roderick and his father Ray - a former acting Police Commissioner and later deputy commissioner until he recently retired - had been improper.

Daniel Zammit, a shareholder in a company with the son of a Paceville kingpin – even threw a birthday party for his brother Roderick at the villa of Luke Chetcuti’s father, Hugo Chetcuti, the owner of various Paceville establishments, who judge Mallia described as a “dubious character whose copious penal record includes regular breaches of rules on his Paceville establishments”.

The findings, which backed up what this newspaper had reported, appeared to have stirred up something of a hornets’ nest within the police force.

And shortly after the results of that damning inquiry, Police Commissioner Michael Cassar had announced a purge in the police force: he issued an internal circular ordering all police officers of every rank to declare any business interests both on a personal basis, and especially those with third parties. At the time he warned that if such declarations were in any way found to be in conflict with their proper functions of the duties on the force, their declarations would not be approved.

Now it transpires the same thing is happening in the army, with this newspaper having reported two separate cases of soldiers owning companies in the security sector, while still serving at the Armed Forces of Malta.

As matters currently stand, it is not known what has become of Commissioner Cassar’s exercise, nor its results.  Nor is it known what action the state has decided upon as regards Daniel Zammit, who is no longer a police officer and as such no longer falls under the force’s disciplinary remit, nor the police’s internal inquiry into the Judge Mallia’s findings as regards his brother’s business interests.

Nor is it known whether the Armed Forces of Malta will, as the police commissioner had done, order soldiers to declare their private business interests and be made to seek the necessary clearance to engage in those businesses – as per the rules and regulations applicable to both police officers and soldiers.

Anything less than meaningful action by both the police and the AFM would mean a continued mockery of the rules that have been flagrantly flouted by so many for so long.

It is perfectly understandable that soldiers and police officers, upon retirement, are free to engage in any business they care to.  And cases of revolving doors are inevitable, people will inevitably seek ways to best utilise the skills they have acquired over the courses of their lives - such as members of the disciplined forces entering the security industry on retirement.

But for some people to engage in the revolving doors routine even before the doors have begun revolving is another matter altogether, and it must be put to an end.