The CEO of the Authority for Integrity in Maltese Sport (AIMS) Jean Claude Micallef submitted his letter of resignation on Wednesday afternoon.
"With regret, I have just submitted my letter of resignation from Chief Executive of the Authority for Integrity in Maltese Sport," Micallef, who is also a former PL MP, wrote on social media.
This comes just three months after Micallef took on the role in December. Times of Malta recently reported that Micallef had engaged Jermain Brincat in a contract to work with AIMS, despite Brincat being a former football player who had been banned from football for life over match-fixing.
His resignation also comes shortly after Times of Malta reported that Sports Minister Clifton Grima allegedly refused to accept the resignations of AIMS Chairman and retired Judge Antonio Mizzi as well as the secretary of the authority, Frank Camilleri.
In his resignation letter, which is addressed to Prime Minister Robert Abela, Micallef said that in light of Minister Grima having refused the resignation of Chairman Mizzi, "I have become constrained to leave my appointment as the Chief Executive of the same Authority with immediate effect".
Micallef remarked that he has been the target of "baseless attacks, obscene lies, and systematic manoeuvres". He continued that despite this, and despite "a lack of adequate resources", he managed to establish regular communication with SportMalta, establish a simplified registration process to the benefit all clubs with the Commissioner for Voluntary Organizations and the MBR, as well as having registered the majority of associations and federations for the first time before the end of March. He listed other accomplishments in addition to this in his resignation letter, including achieving a record number of antidoping tests.
Having said that, Micallef commented that it is "appropriate to remind" that prior to his appointment as the CEO of AIMS, "There were already signs of resistance from the present Board led by Judge Emeritus Antonio Mizzi for my engagement with the Authority". Micallef continued that despite being accepted, "the Chairman chose to put me through grilling on my personal life and presented me with a work contract with a salary inferior to that of a CEO with the scope of discouraging me from accepting the offer".
In a social media post including the resignation letter, Micallef also made a statement addressing the allegations of him having engaged Brincat with AIMS. "Before the AIMS board, I tabled the employment contract of an individual which resulted to me to be fraudulent and that it should have been declared null." Micallef said that it was there that one of the "protagonists of this contract" worked in a manner which was "to mislead [through] an obscene lie in collaboration with the Times of Malta" and then, according to Micallef, presented it "as if I had actually employed or paid Jermain Brincat at any stage."
Micallef said that the request for quotations was not issued by him, but was instead issued by Ryan Borg, who Micallef says was Mizzi's choice to succeed Luciano Busuttil as CEO.
"Maliciously, an employee of the Authority stole the document from Sandro Micallef's desk, placed it on the only white table, and took photos that were sent to The Times, making it appear as if it were a true and complete contract," Jean Claude Micallef commented.
He added that Times of Malta "also published the clothing of the pseudo-photographer", as he remarked that "every employee at the Authority knows who it was". Regarding this matter, Times of Malta stated that it was a journalist who took the photograph of the contract and added that the photograph was taken at the journalist's residence.
Micallef concluded by saying that "there were never whistleblowers, but only mud throwers". He said that he has never given a contract at any stage. He stated that he only gave new contracts of engagement for three Doping Control Officers (DCO) and that he had appointed Lead DCOs. He added that he also reached an agreement for legal services with two lawyers.