Silvio Scerri shouts into phone in public: “I want that revolver on my desk now.”
I have just received a telephone call from a member of the public who identified himself clearly and who decided to ring me after looking at pictures of Manuel Mallia’s head of secretariat, Silvio Scerri, on this website.
What follows is an abbreviated transcript of this eyewitness account.
In summer last year I went to supper with a couple of friends at Sale e Pepe at the Portomaso Marina, and afterwards we decided to go for a drink at Tiffany’s Champagne Bar a few steps away because there’s a terrace where you can smoke.
The man with Manuel Mallia in the photos on your site was sitting there with a Maltese woman with very dark hair. Soon after we got there he rang someone and stood up and began walking around shouting into his phone: “Ara x’qed nghidlek, dak ir-revolver irridu fuq id-desk ISSA! Int taf li jien ghandi permess biex immur fejn irrid bir-revolver. Qed nghidlek gibuli ISSA.”
My friends and I were looking at him and saying, “Who the hell is this bluffer.” We had no idea who he is, but it was quite obvious to us that he was going out of his way to impress the woman he was with. We wondered why he was saying that in front of us, and then it occurred to us that he didn’t realise we are Maltese.
I even remember what he ordered to drink because he made a scene about that as well. A Bulgarian waiter asked him what he would like – he’s a really nice waiter, good at his job, very polite – and that man in your photos asked for a milkshake with Red Bull in it. The waiter tried to suggest that maybe he should try something else, that Red Bull doesn’t really mix well with milkshake, and Scerri began hitting the table with a cigarette packet and said to him: “You. Get. Me. What. I. Asked. For. OK?” The waiter was completely taken aback and went and got him his milkshake with Red Bull.
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They seem to be riding high on Red Bull. Well, I suppose it is milder than Earl Grey.
Kollha fuq ir-Red Bull qeghdin. Do they drink it at Castille as well?
Journalists should start asking Labour protagonists what their favourite drink is.
After that scene the waiter probably spat in his shake.
That’s an added ingredient, free of charge.
And it is a great bonding agent for milkshake and Red Bull.
Milkshake with Red Bull is a Sheehan family recipe – so I am told.
But Scerri said he hardly knew Sheehan and did not have his number.
Damn! It was Red Bull all along, even when the very best PN strategists thought that they were all high on Kool-Aid.
Milkshake with Red Bull?
[Daphne – I think the far more concerning issue is the revolver, don’t you?]
Can we work out the time frame? This happened at the beginning of October.
http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2013/10/silvio-scerris-ex-wife-lodges-a-report-against-him-at-the-police-station-the-police-officer-who-issued-the-charges-is-transferred/
How can a semi-auto pistol be a revolver?
[Daphne – In Maltese all short-barrelled pieces are revolvers. He was speaking Maltese.]
Why not say “pistola”?
A pistola pre-dated the revolver and it is used in the Maltese language of the past and of the present.
[Daphne – Because they’re not literate, Ken. That should have been established by now. Revolver is now the Maltese word for any short-barrelled handpiece.]
Okay, that makes sense.
I would not want the guilty party to walk away a free bird on a technicality of weapon description wording error in a court case.
You never know with these weasels and their pro Labour Party stacked judiciary system.
Pistola is in Italian.
In Maltese we call it rovelver.
‘levolver’
Actually it’s ‘rovelver’ presumably because it ‘rovelvs’.
more like ‘revulver’
Did Scerri say revolver or ‘roverver’?
Are you completely sure that short-barrelled pistols are called ‘rovovers’ in Maltese?
In that case better alert all the schools to introduce this as a new poster.
I’m sure it’s important as everyone will start carrying protection under Labour.
I find this rather odd as when I get involved with the word ‘revolver’ it was always about antique pieces.
In fact at first I thought that Mr Scerri was into antiques, then I was disgusted by his behaviour.
‘Who does he think he is?’ Really.
“Pistola is in Italian.
In Maltese we call it rovelver.”
Before Sam Colt popularized the revolver, starting in about 1838, a single shot flintlock or percussion cap pistol was called a “pistola” in Malta by the Maltese.
Italian or English loan-words are not a new idea to the Maltese language.
You’re 100% right
Daphne with all due respect this is hearsay. I don’t like this government as much as you don’t like them. But we can’t accept an alleged overhead conversation as being truth. Its not worthy of being on your blog.
[Daphne – Optimist, I have been in this business since I was 25. I am as seasoned as Angelo Gafa and Michael Cassar, to mention two policemen who are in the news, at assessing what people are saying when they are saying it. And beyond that, people intent on causing damage with a false account invariably do so anonymously. False accounts are not presented under a real identity. People give me their real identity because I am committed to non-cooperation with the police on these matters, and because I am protected at law from being made to reveal my sources – which I wouldn’t reveal anyway. It is NOT hearsay. It is an eyewitness account. With your reasoning, journalists would have to actually see and hear everything themselves so as to write about it. That’s not how it works.]
I wonder, can’t the police present you with a search warrant for some pretended reason, and confiscate your computer and accessories and access the e-mail addresses and other info regarding the persons who have contacted you?
[Daphne – No. They can’t. That has been established already in the Norman Vella case. And even if it hadn’t been established at law, I would not allow it anyway. How are they going to get into my house unless I lock up the dogs and open the gate? I do not cooperate with police abuse, and I can never understand why people do. People in Malta have such a poor understanding of their rights under the Constitution and are so ready to submit to abusive orders. It’s incredible.]
You should write a basic article on dos and don’ts for when the Malta Police Farce call at the door.
They could always drop PC 533 over your wall and while the dogs eat him make a dash for your computer.
This sounds like a scene from Boardwalk Empire, i.e. the 1920s.
Imagine trusting a man who’s full of bull, with a gun.
Imagine if he is also full of bullshit.
Full of Red Bull you mean.
The police should investigate Scerri and see if he is or has been illegally keeping a firearm on his person.
This is extremely serious especially since he is supposed to be under investigation for conspiring to kill Scott Dixon.
The arrogance of some very high-ranking people in the current Home Affairs Ministry alone is more than the whole government and the previous government (in 25 years) put together.
Besides Manuel Mallia and all the political connotations that arose with the shooting incident, there bare facts remain that somebody less than trustworthy was in possession of a gun and used it.
In the US, one of the most hotly debated topics is gun violence with several components of civil society including health lobbies continually pointing out the mortality and injuries as a consequence of intended and unintentional episodes involving legitimate or illegitimate use of guns.
Guns are dangerous. As citizens we have a right to know whether this government intends to change the laws on gun possession or whether it has done so already albeit keeping us in the dark.
YOU try to obtain a licence to hold and to carry in public a hand-held gun and see how far you will get if you are not a high ranking Labour Party politician.
Oh My God! What a country of bullies we got ourselves into.
Whenever I see a picture of that man anywhere, he gives me the creeps.
Is this a scene from The Godfather?
Power corrupts and blinds people.
[Daphne – Silvio Scerri did not need power for that. He was that way already, which is precisely WHY he wanted power.]
Guns are inanimate and so cannot be dangerous.
It is only people who are dangerous, more so if they are stupid and full of themselves.
A deep hole in the ground is also inanimate.
Wet floor is also inanimate.
Unsound building is also inanimate.
Leaking gas, naked fire… Inanimate does not mean not dangerous but means you have to take caution.
Not so sure that the revolver is more concerning than the milkshake with Red Bull.
ma tal biza back to the biza days
That would have made a pretty good parliamentary question – a list of esteemed citizens holding a ‘permess biex imorru fejn iridu bir-revolver’ – but I’m afraid that’s not fl-interess tal-poplu as it could endanger is-sigurta nazzjonali.
In any case, such details should be kept away from the children as long as they know that bouncers, garbage collectors and bus drivers are not on the list.
I once had a telephone conversation with this man. He’s like that, only now it must be worse considering the powerful position he now holds. In my opinion he’s got the makings of a megalomaniac.
This man is the Chief of Staff of the most powerful man in Malta, Minister Manwel Mallia who controls those national assets that in a banana republic are the first to be taken over during a coupe d’état: The armed forces, the police and the media.
Even Hitler had the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda under two separate henchmen, Himmler and Goebbels.
Here Joseph Muscat thinks its a good idea to have two very sensitive yet disparate portfolios to be controlled by one lawyer with a dubious set of connections as a minimum.
It is simply not logical and there must be some obscure, underworld stranglehold on the PM. If you have another benign explanation, please do tell us so we can sleep easier.
It must be all that backing they’re doing…flour and all.
Now I know why Red Bull gives you wings. He was in the air when he pulled the trigger.
Che stronzo.
These people are in the business of being nasty.
They are not in the business of being aboveboard in their approach.
Everything is sly. Nothing is what it is meant to be.
People who get in their way are “dealt with” as minor inconveniences, as though they are flicking off bacteria.
This is a world that the majority of Maltese wildly rushed to embrace.
The mask was too ridiculous not to have fallen completely.
A vice based agenda.
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In similar cases, there are people who wish to back out when they realise the full extent of evil operating in the top echelons..
Depending on the nature of the top hierarchy, and if they are permitted to leave in one piece, they ask for liability disclaimers. Guarantees. Referrals and letters of recommendation if they can bring themselves to use them.
They can be pretty useless in this globalised world
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Anyone who pinned their career to Joseph Muscat’s tails and who is now an unwilling part of the post-election meritocracy crowd, or there by accident, will realise that their career has been hijacked by a crowd that cares not a jot.
If they have any ethical backbone but stay in the hope that they can ride it out, find a better exit point, they should be told that a better exit point than right upon awareness won’t happen.
This sort of scam is a very vicious circle with only a downward spiral..
It has it’s own nature of withdrawal symptoms.
You would do the least damage to yourselves to leave a toxic environment right now. Less pay should not detract, even if it is difficult to handle.
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The desperate will remain and the situation will get more aggressive.
The bait will adapt to the need as the talk adapts to the situation. Nothing is certain.
The core is uninterested in those there to be used. Everyone is replaceable.
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For those that do leave more will be sourced. There will be a lettered-but-chained level. Not passionate this time, but willing anyway.
This is more of a blow.
Brain damage for Malta where codes again get twisted.
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Every time the Maltese are in this situation, the quality of freedom obtained is determined by what has been lost and what we are prepared to pay to reclaim it.
Interesting tale – bizarre choice of drink at best. Not sure whether his lady friend may have been impressed by his choice – absolute wanker.
Sa fejn naf jien licenzja jrid ikollok mhux permess sabiex ikollok arma u to keep not to carry jekk mhux xi senter ghal kacca
I would not be surprised in the least.