Scum in an Italian suit
He should have stuck with cock-fighting. It's the only mentality he understands.
Now perhaps those who so admired Franco Debono, in their Sunday newspaper columns and in their amateurish and manipulative political commentary on the internet (din ghalik, Josanne Cassar), will understand that they hadn’t a clue what they were talking about, largely because they didn’t know what had been going on behind the scenes for four long years.
Either that, or they’re really poor judges of character and can’t assess people’s vested interests and motivation – worrying traits in those who write about politics and current affairs.
Just look at this scandalous example which has been made public at last. I know of several more, but have been told them in confidence and off the record, and so cannot report them.
However, I have assessed Franco Debono in the context of those facts. I cannot report the facts themselves, but I can say what my opinion is, based on those facts.
Some of you laughed when I wrote that Debono’s aim was to become prime minister, not justice minister, and thought it far-fetched. But I was right, and I didn’t even know this about Beppe Fenech Adami. I’d merely worked it out for myself on the basis of what I knew, and the emerging patterns in the man’s behaviour.
And despite having worked it out already, and despite having known (but in confidence and off the record) that Franco Debono laid siege to the prime minister when Carm Mifsud Bonnici was in hospital, having decided that this was his moment, I am still shocked to hear it confirmed by Beppe Fenech Adami.
Some ambitions are realistic; others are just plain abnormal. The abnormal might get there – think of all the tyrants we have known – but that does not make them right or admirable.
It usually makes them very dangerous.
As I wrote earlier this month, the government was imperilled the minute Joseph Muscat was elected Labour leader and became Leader of the Opposition, and not because of Joseph but because of Franco. At that moment, it all changed for Franco Debono. If Joseph Muscat was Leader of the Opposition then he, who got better marks in Form IIC, would have to be prime minister.
And then some people say that this man is normal, only misunderstood. He’s scum, scum in an Italian suit.
I would say the same of any politician who is this way, whatever the party ticket. This is a person’s character we are talking about here, not his political affiliation.
timesofmalta.com, this morning
DEBONO WANTED TO BECOME PM – Beppe Fenech Adami
Franco Debono wanted to become Prime Minister and make Beppe Fenech Adami his Justice Minister, the latter said this morning.
Nationalist MP Beppe Fenech Adami this morning accused Franco Debono of having been mounting pressure on the Prime Minister for a long time to appoint him minister instead of Carm Mifsud Bonnici.
Speaking on Radio Malta’s programme Ghandi x’Nghid, Dr Fenech Adami, who is parliamentary assistant in the Justice Ministry, said that Dr Debono was mounting pressure even when the minister was in hospital.
There was even an incident when Super One had ran a story that he (Dr Fenech Adami) was to become Justice Minister. He used that moment to increase his lobbying for the minister’s removal.
The Nationalist MP said that there was even a time last year, at around when the budget votes were being debated, that Dr Debono approached him personally telling him that if he supported him in his moves and he became Prime Minister he would propose him for Justice Minister.
Dr Fenech Adami said that when he told Dr Debono that this was not the way to do things, Dr Debono told him to forget everything.
Dr Fenech Adami said that even when there was the issue of public transport, Dr Debono had told him his approach against Minister Austin Gatt was to get back at him for an incident 10 years ago when, as a lawyer, he represented a family who was requesting compensation which Dr Gatt had believed was too high.
Dr Fenech Adami said that although Dr Debono had a lot of praise for his father Eddie, he could not understand how he had never recognised his capabilities by placing him on government boards.
He said that Dr Debono expected the Nationalist Party to issue a public statement thanking him for ridding the party of (former minister) Louis Galea.
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Since you are quoting The Times, I think it is only fair to also print, Dr.Debon’s reply.on the same paper.
[Daphne – Fair? This is an opinion piece, not a news report. And even news reports are required to place statements in the context of a person’s credibility. Beppe Fenech Adami is credible. Franco Debono is not. One day I might understand, Silvio, why repeatedly side with John Dalli, Franco Debono and the like. Do they represent something special to you?]
@Silvio
What are you on about man? Do you know on which side your toast is buttered?
And what a whacky reply thatwas from Debono. He was all over the place, going off at tangents.
He also took the opportunity to remind the reader that he garnered as many votes as Beppe Fenech Adami in the last elections, even though his father is a mere civil servant, as opposed to an ex-PM and President of Malta.
The chip on his shoulder is surely the size of the Grand Canyon by now.
And what IS it with all that competitive comparison?
Form IIC grades, faring better than Gordon Pisani at school and now getting as many votes as Beppe Fenech Adami.
I wonder if he’s one of those guys who can’t help having a furtive glance at the ‘linef’ of the chaps on either side of him in public lavatories, to see how he sizes up.
Daphne,I never doubted Beppe’s credibilty.
As for Dalli, yes I still think that he could be an asset to any government. No country can just waste persons of John’s capabilities.
[Daphne – To use your talents, you don’t have to be in the government or working for the government, Silvio. His talents seem to have been put to pretty good use elsewhere. Let him stay there.]
As for Franco, I always said that the way he is carrying on his crusade is totally wrong, but we have to admit that it takes quite a MAN, to solely keep a country on edges, and I always admired a man who sticks to what he believes, come rain or shine. Right or wrong is a totally an other question.
[Daphne – No, Silvio, it does not take a man. It takes a psychopathological egotist. If that is your definition of a man, then it is not surprising your sort of hero is Benito Mussolini.]
As for G. Mifsud’s question, I must admit that my toast is not buttered on either side, as I think butter it is not very healthy.
The motto ” Meglio vivere..etc ” has nothing to do with Mussolini.
It was coined in 1918 during the Battle Of The River Piave, led by General Armando Diaz, agaainst the Austrians.
[Daphne – It has since, however, become associated with Mussolini, which is why sensible people don’t quote it. And that is aside from the fact that the man who lived one day as a lion ended up lynched by a mob and strung upside down with his mistress.]
Thank you J Abela, for enlightening us, the unintelligent and ignorant.
I’d mistakenly taken Beppe Fenech Adami as a level-headed and clever chap, of fine pedigree, and great professional integrity and credibility.
I stand corrected. Dr. Debono was OBVIOUSLY just joking around. I mean – he’s such a kidder.
Debono has got personality issues and these are so obvious to people who live in much more complex, democratic and tolerant societies.
Nobody who utters ‘Jiena, jiena, jiena’ hundreds of times in a conversation would be taken seriously in any western country.
I wouldn’t have someone like that in my house if you paid me.
My guests would be wondering what on earth is wrong with me if I had to land them with a twat like Franco.
I know many Maltese people like to start their conversations with a ‘Jiena’ but this man is unbearable and possibly the most boring person on the Maltese scene at the moment.
And that is apart from his presumption that he has the credentials to be prime minister.
Did you expect Franco Debono to admit what Beppe revealed about the scoundrel?
Silvio, you are either naive or perhaps gunning for Joseph?
Fair? I just read something in the newspapers – I don’t even know which one and I don’t care – which made my stomach churn. It said that Franco Debono said that Beppe is a liar just like his father was.
I read that much on some headline on the front page which continues on some other page inside the actual paper. Of course, reading that phrase is enough for me to make me loathe Franco Debono, but then, why do I loathe him and others like him?
I feel cheated, angry and bitter, but not because Gonzi will, in a few short months, no longer be in government but because the people who will govern us are the ones who are hypocritically insulting us this morning during the PL General Conference.
This morning, a certain Yana Mintoff something took the “podium” at the Labour conference and regaled us with HER version of life here in the last 20 years.
She said that the Maltese have horrible conditions of work, that we have no decent life, that we’re horribly treated, that our air is polluted, our electricity dirty, our waters murky, our roads disastrous (particularly fis-sawt), and basically she described us living in some dump. She also said that her father is worried because the Maltese are not leading a decent life.
[Daphne – Her father being Dom Mintoff, who is senile.]
She said that under Labour, our work conditions were great, we had a great life and all of us went about life skipping happily and singing a merry tune. How would she know? She didn’t live here. She lived in England – because her mother was English – and was at the time busy making the London newspaper headlines by throwing sacks of manure about in the British parliament.
Of course for people like Yana, life had to be a bed of roses under her father or Labour in general. While we lived in hell, she did what she pleased – the Aisha Gaddafi of her time.
The fact is that life under Labour is miserable. I can already hear the rumblings of it. Like an approaching thunderstorm, I can hear Joseph’s words foreboding an inevitable yet inexorable reality: a Labour government will give importance to what infrastructurally really matters, a Labour government will let you work, a Labour government will not waste money on things which are only cosmetic.
When I hear people like Leo Brincat who speaks about il-pajjiz stagnat, and Anglu Farrugia and all the other stalwarts, young and old, speaking about living in hell now, I cannot but think to myself, hell?
If these people think this is hell they do not want to preserve what we have now.They want to take away this “hell” as substitute it with what was really hell. Only, now it will be worse because we have got used to those little things in life which people who just scrape through, who have trouble keeping up their mortgage payments, if they manage at all, do not even dream about.
It will only take one year but one year down the line we will all look back (not I, because I already know this), but as a nation we will collectively look back and think what fools we are to have thrown “hell” away. But then, alas, it will be too late.
While people are saying that life is hell, they are eating out in restaurants and having their hair done whilst the irony should be screaming at them from the menus they’re perusing and from under the hair-driers which are drowning out their conversation.
I didn’t wake up in a bad moood today. My mood was stellar. However, the sudden sadness that came crushing down on me, when I heard this Yana addressing the conference, all I could say was: b’liema dritt? Kif ma jisthux?
Yet, there she was, insulting our way of life as indecent, and telling us that her father was worried about our indecent way of life. He, he whose legacy is ignorance and hatred, is worrying about OUR way of life.
Whilst I completely disagree with Franco’s antics such comments by Beppe Fenech Adami and other MPs will in my opinion only continue to aggravate the situation.
On another note, I recently came across a court report in The Times whereby a number of individuals have defrauded the EU at least €96,000. Strangely enough this story did not get any mention.
Is there a reason? Is it because the list consists of known Nationalist and Labour sympathisers?
What a strange country we live in.
[Daphne – I don’t know what political party they sympathise with, but I did notice that one of them is Labour politician Claudette Baldacchino. I didn’t notice any other politicians because I’m not au fait with the details of local councils and so on, though I did take note of Labour mayor Michael Cohen.]
What about the other story of both political parties not having paid their respective headquarters’ electricity bill? Malta’s largest known secret if ever there was one. Both defrauding the government. How nice.
Michael Cohen (in representation of the PL) is the President of the Local Councils Association, Mayor of the Kalkara Local Council, Head of the Maltese delegation (2010-2014) to Congress of Local and Regional Authorities and Full Member of the Institutional Committee) of the European Union.
Claudette Attard Baldacchino (in representation of the PL) is the Deputy Mayor of the Qrendi Local Council, Deputy President of the Local Councils Association and Full member of the Sustainable Development Committee of the EU.
More importantly, up to some time ago she was selected as the Personal Assistant to Joseph Muscat from which position she resigned for some unknown reason recently.
Yes, a couple of Labour and Nationalist working with the same fraudulent system to screw up the EU.
The director and shareholder of the travel agency is a Nationalist supporter and as you know involved in various other sectors. What baffles me is why such a scheme and incident has not made it to the news big time and I’m not referring to your blog.
My reasoning is that since it involves both PN & MLP it was conveniently not aggressively reported.
Link to full article in The Times: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120111/local/Councillors-face-fraud-charges.401857
And predictably enough Super One never covered that news item. Miskina Claudette, kollox tort ta’ ta dawk in-Nazzjonalisti!
What I see here is a trend in the way Franco ‘gossips’.
Always starts off with: dak habib kbir tieghi u m’ghandi xejn kontrih, pero…
Same here, he seems to have had a lot of praise for Eddie Fenech Adami, but…
When he was on Bondi+, this was the general format of how he talked about someone, be it Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici or any other politician.
M’ghandi xejn kontrih ta, habib tieghi u nirrispettah, imma just hekk…
Looking at Franco’s body language you can tell he thinks everyone else is very inferior.
Franco ghandhu kontra kollox u kontra kullhadd, and he has no respect for anyone but himself.
He thinks that he everyone and everything revolves around him and that he is the new messiah sent to deliver us from the forces of evil.
His envy has taken him over so much that he is unable to think straight and reason. He has pressed the self-destruct button and unfortunately will bring everyone down with him.
I have absolutely no doubt that Beppe is saying the truth.
Of course he is. What I’d like to know is how many others were approached and how many were recruited to Franco’s mission (impossible). And how many of them saw fit to warn Dr. Gonzi of the treachery being brewed.
Nobody is believing Fenech Adami. Everyone is saying he is as big a liar as his father was certified to be by the courts.
Sorry.
[Daphne – Oh, hello ‘Martin Borg’. I see you have migrated here from maltatoday.com.mt’s comments board. Tired of the lousy company round there, are you? Don’t fall victim to ‘group think’, my dear. Your little beetle friends are not ‘everybody’, just as the rest of us are far from being ‘nobody’. Some would say that our opinion is the valid one, given that, unlike the average denizen of Saviour Balzan’s internet skip, most of us can actually think.]
Martin, dear, I declare that I am one of many who totally believe Beppe Fenech Adami. Sorry.
ditto
Don’t speak on my behalf please
For the record, Martin Borg is the little twerp who warned me on MaltaToday that my days are numbered. He hides behind ‘thor’ (because, you know, he’s a god) on Malta Today, ‘balky’ on x.com and, most likely, other silly pseudonyms on other sites.
I believe what Dr Fenech Adami says, Mr Martin Borg.
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Product suggestion for those who own dogs and are sick of Franco: http://www.betterware.co.uk/stuffing-free-dog-toy-chicken.html
Do you really believe that those now admiring FD didn’t have a clue what it is all about?
Oh boy do they know!
They keep urging him on to reach their aim and nothing else.
When it is all over they will just dump him.
It is the poor sod himself who does not have a clue of what is in store for him once this saga is over and done with, and the sooner the better.
What difference does it make? For all that it matters Franco might want to bring down the government because he’s jealous of Emanuel Delia’s beard. It’s all irrelevant.
The only thing that matters is that come Thursday he will most likely vote against the government.
Beppe’s behaviour is baffling. Why would he issue such a statement to the press? How could the PN possibly benefit from it?
Even if what he says is true it’s merely reinforcing the notion that the PN is trying to smear Franco in any way possible.
Coming out with such a statement now simply begs the question: if they knew something was wrong with him why didn’t they get rid of him earlier?
[Daphne – How? Any miraculous solutions? Though yes, I agree he should have been publicly bollocked from day one, and stuffed right back in his box. By letting the situation run on, it was only made worse. I am glad Beppe said what he did. I am totally against colluding with people like Franco by covering up for them. Daylight is the worst enemy of crazy notions and blackmail. Exposing him to public opprobrium and the full scrutiny of electors, as he is now, would have been the most effective way to deal with him way back then. Franco blackmails you? Go to the press. Then we’ll see whether he dares do it again. This was always my approach to how he should be dealt with. The last few times he rang me to badger me about something, I didn’t pick up and then pressed Refuse. He never rang me again.]
At this point the PN’s best strategy is to push forward Franco Debono’s suggestions for tighter libel and slander laws before Labour’s media machine gets any more power (something’s got to replace Bondi+, right?).
[Daphne – They’re tight enough already. That’s hardly the point. When lies are spread, they’re spread, and a court judgement in your favour five years down the line is not going to change that, nor is it going to remove the lies from the internet.]
Ok, let’s try to make some sense.
Franco intends to keep the legislature in place, otherwise why bother presenting a motion if he intends to bring the house down?
We have it from reliable sources that Franco is after the PM’s seat.
Franco’s working on his own leadership in parallel with someone working on his in the PL.
Joseph fell for it.
Franco’s proposal to do away with internal disciplinary bodies introduces a major difficulty for Labour’s structure, currently propping Joseph.
It could be someone who had to give up his candidature to Anglu. And it’s not Chris Cardona.
What Beppe said about Franco that he wanted to be minister of justice when Carm was sick is hundred per cent true. I knew about it – Franco was putting lots of pressure on the prime minister to make him a minister instead of Carm.
You have to be mean and selfish to do such a thing when your colleague is in hospital and critically ill.
The Labour Party told us before Beppe Fenech Adami that Baggio’s aims were to be Prime Minister. They put it on a billboard for everyone to see.
Baggio never issued a denial of that.
This is how I see it.
Franco will cross the floor to form a coalition against Gonzi, where Joseph will be Prime Minister and Franco Debono Minister for Justice and vice prime minister.
Gonzi presents his resignation from party leader and in comes Dalli to grab what’s left of the PN.
Within six months we will see the Sargas power station contract signed.
The guy is flagrantly abusing of a weak majority in parliament and showing no respect towards those who elected him and the Nationalist Party.
My God, he is doublecrossing us and putting the whole system into disrepute and ridicule.
Unfortunately the scum material includes a number of conspirators on the government backbench and elsewhere.
Vanity and self love have brought down greater men than this little worm.
I believe that Consuelo is rubbing her hands in glee. It seems that with all this, she will, after all, remain there, stronger witha better chance of being made a judge in the not so distant future.
Some people don’t believe Beppe Fenech Adami.
Why should we believe Franco Debono?