“Here, take this used and broken Phillips razor and keep it as a souvenir of how great and generous I am.”
31 March 1979: and they call it Freedom Day
Kristina Chetcuti at The Times has outdone herself in the deadpan-reporting stakes this morning. I was in fits, and at the same time thoroughly appalled at how mean Mintoff really was and how his human dogs licked him harder the more he treated them with contempt and kicked them.
I can’t believe these idiots actually boast about their stupidity and don’t realise how awful the picture they paint of Mintoff really is, when what they imagine is that they are depicting a generous hero.
“Here, take my old razor which doesn’t work any more and keep it as a souvenir. I’m not actually paying you for the new one you brought back for me from England.”
“Here take this unwanted gift. I hate it and have no room for it in this house.”
“A prisoner spent weeks carving this wooden eagle for me, but I don’t appreciate it at all, so take it. You’re the sort of person who likes this kind of trash.”
“I love Mintoff more than I love my wife, and respect him more too. When my wife needed me in hospital, Mintoff rang and so I left her side and rushed to his.”
Thank God I grew up surrounded by this crap and think it’s normal (for Malta). That saves me the hassle of trying to work out whether large chunks of the Maltese population are mad or weird, some random sailor having fed a freakishly mutated gene into the population 500 years ago.
But I wonder what some younger people think. How do they get their heads round this kind of thing?
And I hope no Forum Zghazagh Laburisti member misses the telling detail that you had to travel abroad to buy a Phillip’s razor at one point.
———-
The Times, today:
BROKEN SPECTACLES AND OTHER MINTOFF MEMORIES
– Son of former leader’s driver shares his precious collection of mementos
Kristina Chetcuti
Pawlu Gafà was Dom Mintoff’s driver. Such was his loyalty towards Il-Perit that when his son was born in 1962, in the midst of the interdiction, he called him Domenic.
“This caused problems,” said Karmena, 78, Mr Gafà’s widow. “Because they wouldn’t baptise him. But in the end I convinced the priest that after all even Duminku Mintoff was named after St Domenic.”
Little Domenic grew up to be as faithful as his father to Mr Mintoff – if not more so.
Today, he has a collection of Mintoff memorabilia that the family gathered over the decades that they knew him.
“These are small things but very precious to us,” said Domenic Gafà, 50, from Santa Lucia.
Among the items they treasure are a pair of broken glasses and a horseshoe. They are framed with a little note from the Perit himself. “My glasses broke and so did my head,” it reads.
They go back to the day when Mr Mintoff fell off a horse and his head was struck by a hoof.
There is also an old Philips shaver. “We were in England and he told me to get him a new one, as the old one had broken. Then he told me to keep it as a souvenir,” said Mr Gafà.
Among Mr Gafà’s Mintoff memorabilia are coins the former PM gave him as pocket money (above), his broken glasses and horseshoe (top) and the table on which the 1969 Church-Labour party agreement was signed (left; letter of authentication, right).
Among Mr Gafà’s Mintoff memorabilia are coins the former PM gave him as pocket money (above), his broken glasses and horseshoe (top) and the table on which the 1969 Church-Labour party agreement was signed (left; letter of authentication, right).
Why would he want to keep an old, broken razor? Wouldn’t that be junk? “Junk!” he said, horrified by the very idea.
“How can it be junk when you know that he was such a great man. From where would I get another one like that?”
Why such loyalty to Mr Mintoff? “I was born in this. My father lived for him.”
Every Sunday his father used to call at Mr Mintoff’s house in Tarxien, to check if he needed any odd jobs done.
“I was only eight years old then, and he used to give me tmintax irbiegħi (the equivalent of €5).” He has kept and framed some of those coins in remembrance.
On the memorabilia table there are a couple of marriage gifts: a clock Mr Mintoff gave his parents when they got married and a huge vase given to him on his wedding day.
“I am very saddened by his death. Somehow I always thought he had the power in him to fight death.
“My father died when I was only 16, so there were times when I used to confide in him.
“He knew things about me that I never told anyone else.
“For me he came first in my life,” he said. Whenever Mr Mintoff summoned him, you could be sure that Mr Gafà would be by his side in five minutes.
“Even my wife knew and accepted that.”
He recalled how once, his wife was in hospital recovering from anaesthetic after undergoing a serious operation.
“I got a call that Mintoff needed me by his side and I left her side,” he said.
He stayed loyal to him till the very end. At the peak of the political turmoil in 1978, Mr Mintoff asked him to start accompanying him to Parliament and other hot spots. And he roped him in again 20 years later, during the 1998 saga that toppled the Labour government.
“I was never involved politically in the Labour party. I was only loyal to Mintoff, the man.
“My job – which I did voluntarily – was to make sure that he got back home safe and sound. I would stay there till he fell asleep and only then would I go home,” he said.
Over the years, he learnt a lot from Mr Mintoff, particularly when it came to negotiations.
“He used to tell me: never back down when negotiating, if you want something, get it.”
Mr Gafa with some of his collection. Photos: Paul Spiteri LucasMr Gafa with some of his collection. Photos: Paul Spiteri Lucas
He also taught him never to go back on his word once he reached an agreement.
He suffered from terrible moods: “That was normal. You had to leave him on his own.”
“Mintoff had a heart of gold,” he said, explaining that he was always handing out gifts, although not bought by himself.
Among the memorabilia, there is also a wooden carved eagle, which a prisoner had given Mr Mintoff.
“He gave it to me then. That’s the thing – he was really generous – he would often pass on presents that he would have received himself.”
There is also a little Australia-shaped metal jigsaw puzzle and an old glass bottle of lemonade.
Perhaps the most precious of all – historically – is an intricately carved wooden table, on top of which the agreement between the Labour Party and the Archbishops of Malta was signed on Easter Saturday, in 1969.
Mr Gafà had never been involved in party politics and never will, he stressed. Because he used to be with Mr Mintoff all the time, he is privy to several important happenings.
“They died with him, and they will die with me.”
Loyal to the end.
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These people are bloody unbelievable. And, although this was written by Kristina Chetcuti in very much the same vein you may have written it yourself, I simply wish that The Times would stop giving Mintoff “air-time”.
If they really feel that they must, then they could, perhaps, run a series of articles entitled “life under Mintoff”. They could start with the ransacking and burning of The Times’ building, to really get in the swing of things,
I think that it is shameful that, despite all that has happened in Malta, they insist on stuffing Mintoff and his acolytes in our face in a “postivie” light.
According to Raymond, this was one of the many ways in which his brother was misunderstood. “For instance, they say he was a miser. But he gave me this Rolex,” he says as he shakes the cherished gold watch worth thousands of euro on his wrist.
To him the wristwatch symbolises his brother’s generosity, even though he knows it was originally a gift from “some head of state” that Dom found too heavy for his own wrist.
———–
Mintoff has often been described as tight-fisted but my own experience was the opposite. For my 35th birthday, he invited me to Delimara, secretly invited my parents, wore a bright checked shirt I had given him, sang “Happy Birthday” and gave me a valuable set of etchings which Aldo Moro had given him.
———–
There is also an old Philips shaver. “We were in England and he told me to get him a new one, as the old one had broken. Then he told me to keep it as a souvenir,” said Mr Gafà.
“Mintoff had a heart of gold,” he said, explaining that he was always handing out gifts, although not bought by himself.
Among the memorabilia, there is also a wooden carved eagle, which a prisoner had given Mr Mintoff.
“He gave it to me then. That’s the thing – he was really generous – he would often pass on presents that he would have received himself.”
———–
Daphne, I do hope that some good might come of the televised state funeral.
I refer to the sight of notorious thugs Il-Qahbu and It-Toto sitting among Labour politicians.
he was indeed a very generous man… santo subito
That explains a lot actually. Mintoff’s idea of generosity – or at least the one he acted on – seems to have been passing on other people’s hard work.
I would argue that real generosity would be passing on your own work / money / time or what have you. The same approach is reflected in the ‘free jobs’ for instance, paid for by somebody else’s hard work (ie taxes).
And this is only half the picture, but thank you Times for publishing it. A small compensation for all the drivel you’ve put us through these last days.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120827/letters/Lest-we-forget.434500
And then, just as the tsunami of historical revisionism on Dom’s political ways started to abate, they cast their beady eyes on his economic policies.
First off the hustings, the most eminent economist Professor Edward Scicluna, with this gem:
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120825/opinion/Recall-Mintoffianomics.434249.
Acoording to the most eminent Profs, Dom’s economic policies were ace, the only small downside being a shortage of foreign toothpaste, Cadbury and TVs – mur ara x’ghageb. Of course, he forgot to mention the use of such shortages as a tool for political patronage and the opportunities that such shortages presented to the babuzli to enrich themselves through wholesale corruption and contraband activities. He also forgot how the people’s resources were used to give land and buildings predominantly to MLP supporters.
Imma dawk dettalji zaghar hux, sur Professur? U int fejn kont tul hafna minn dan l-operat ekonomiku mannifiku tad-Dumink? X’kont qed taghmel?
Maybe the eminent Profs would also care to tell us if he is agitating to have some of Dom’s enlightened policies re-introduced by that new Salvatur Joseph.
Aren’t gifts given by heads of state the property of the State?
Apparently, Pawlu Gafa treasures a pair of broken spectacles. and a broken shaver.
Perhaps the Fenech Adami family could pass on some smashed furniture to add to his collection.
And there might still be a singed desk or two at the Progress Press. Would Mr Gafa like them as mementoes?
No collection would be complete without a couple of corpses. At least one should be dismembered.
Many years ago, my dear grandfather used to tell me a story about Duminku. Being a kid, and knowing that my nannu was a fierce Nationalist, I did not believe him, but after reading about the Rolex and broken shaver gift stories, I now know that my grandfather was probably telling the truth.
There was a couple in Bormla who lived with their five children in two squalid rooms on the fifth storey of a tenement building. Their living conditions were imaginably horrible. So the father goes to Mintoff and asks for help.
Mintoff promised to help. A few months went by but nothing happened. The man goes back to Mintoff and holds him to his promise. Il-Perit tells him he has a solution and asks him to meet him at Delimara the following week.
The man keeps the appointment and waits patiently in the scorching sun while Mintoff swims. Mintoff comes out of the sea, pops home to L-Gharix and returns with a kid (as in baby goat). Mintoff instructs the man to take care of the kid for a few weeks, and says that under no circumstances is he to let anything bad happen to it.
The man is dumbfounded but leaves with the kid, which joins the family of seven in two small rooms on the fifth storey.
A month later the wife cannot take it any longer and the man returns to Dellimara with growing goat. Mintoff accepts it back and the man returns to his family ever so grateful that the Salvatur solved their precarious problem and bettered their living conditions.
Tmintax irbieghi was equivalent to some 35 eurocents and NOT E 5.
Is this the same Dominic Gafa who somehow got a cleaning contract at Malta International Airport?
I know who Dominic Gafà is very well. I do not know about the cleaning contracts but he did get a few retail concessions at the Airport. This happened during a Nationalist government – but that’s another story.
I am not surprised by any of what Gafà is says here. He is obsessed with Mintoff and never made a secret of it.
He introduces himself as “Dominic, taf ghal Mintoff semmewni”.
He is illiterate but seems to have learnt the tricks of how to do business by getting the right people into his pocket.
Incidentally he was a porter/loader with AirMalta and was, at the same time, given retail concessions at the airport. As I said how and why is another interesting story.
Can you share please? It’s fun learning history through this blog.
Boasting that they were like those stray cats that you see your nanna feeding dinner scraps to.
Hekk hu. Filwaqt li kien jahdem taparsi l
Hekk hu. Filwaqt li kien jahdem loader mal-Air Malta, qatt ma kien jidher ghax xoghol.
Bhala ringrazzjament tas-servizz siewi li ghamel ghal Air Malta, in-Nazzjonalisti tawh kuntratt tal-cleaning tal-ajruport.
Kemm kellu hbieb l-Air Malta! Isibuh bhal bin Mintoff!
Qatt ma tqazzez ma hadd almenu, u smajna li ghandu shab mieghu ras kbira ohra. L-Air Malta regghat gedditlu l-kuntratt mid-dehra.
Fatta. I know exactly how. This time Mintoff ma ghandu x’jaqsam xejn.
I still cherish a Desserta bar which I keep as a memory of dear Dom the monster who gave us hell.
that is what hurts most…Il-Laburisti gawdew iktar minn Nazjonalisti