So did the hero of the urban underclass die a pauper?
A mourner at Mintoff’s funeral
This is part of my column in The Malta Independent on Sunday, 26 August.
Now that all the fun, games and circuses of the funeral of the year are over, it’s time for the press to turn its attention to some of the real stories.
The first thing the newspapers should do is follow the British practice of reporting on the last will and testament of the deceased former prime minister.
Wills are public deeds in Malta as they are in Britain, and anyone can order a copy. You certainly don’t have to be a journalist. The difference is that newspapers have a duty to investigate this kind of thing.
The system is as follows.
You first have to get Dominic Mintoff’s death certificate from the Public Registry (Civil Status Section at the Evans Building, Valletta). All you have to do is turn up and give his name and date of death, and request a copy. Anyone can do this, but you might be asked to show your identity card.
If the person behind the desk gets difficult, state your rights and remind them that these are public documents and that you are not asking for anything that the law does not permit you to have.
It usually takes the Public Registry around three weeks to register a death, and you won’t be able to get the death certificate until then, but in Mintoff’s case it might be done sooner.
His heirs might want his death certificate immediately, so as to hurry up the processing of their inheritance. And that particular pig has always been the most equal one of all.
You will be given a copy of the death certificate over the counter. If they tell you to return later, say that you would like it at once, please, and that you will wait right there.
Take this death certificate and walk to the Public Registry (Searches Dept) in West Street, and order a search for Dom Mintoff’s last will and testament. This takes about five days, and you will be sent a list of the wills Mintoff made.
You then take this list to the Notary to Government (M. A. Vassalli Street, Valletta) and order the most recent will on the list, which is generally the valid one if it cancels out all previous wills. Sometimes, the most recent will is an additional one, and does not cancel out the previous. You will either be given a copy of this will immediately or have to wait up to three days. In this case, the wait is legitimately required and is not a harassment tactic.
Of course, the will might not say much that is of interest. It might simply say that he leaves all his holdings to his daughters/the dogs/cats/horses without specifying what those holdings are. This is what people in Malta usually do.
The heirs then use their notary to run a search among the banks in Malta. It is obviously more difficult to track down holdings overseas, and these tend to be specified in wills unless the heirs are informed beforehand of what there is and where.
Whatever the case, Mintoff’s will is of public interest and should, consequently, be published in the press. This is a man who, as prime minister, persecuted others for their holdings but never revealed his own, which were rumoured to be considerable. He began making large sums of money at the outset of his career, with his work on the rebuilding of Malta under the War Damage Commission.
His earnings, like those of his ministers, were always concealed while he lived the life of a miser and forced his wife into abject penury, to the point where she became dependent on the charity of her friends.
We know that he acquired, a few years ago, around one million euros as compensation for pain and suffering caused by the building of the Delimara power station next to his summer house. We also know that he acquired $250,000 from Gaddafi as his special human rights prize awardee.
But beyond that, any other holdings should be questioned, given that Mintoff ceased professional practice as an architect to concentrate on running the Labour Party into the ground and then doing the same with the country. So on paper and officially, all he had was his documented salary and unearned income from investments made with earlier income.
At least one of the obituaries in the international press alluded to his concealed riches, but strangely enough, in Malta it is not considered to be the public’s business.
Of course, if Eddie Fenech Adami had exploited his position as party leader and prime minister to strike deals for himself and acquire large amounts of money, the press would be crawling all over the story. But where Mintoff is concerned, people still get fearful.
As I said, that particular pig has always been the most equal pig of all, even in death.
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Why don’t you take it on yourself and find these things out?
[Daphne – How did you reach the conclusion that I haven’t? I’m not selfish, though.]
Did you do this when Dr De Marco died , or Lorry Sant & il Fusellu or their accountant.
Just asking.
You should upload your findings?
[Daphne – Ara hi, ghax ma tmurx tfittxu int, issa la darba taf preciz kif.]
but stupid enough that more than half if these islands hate you not your guts but you and what you represents
il hipocrasija ta dil mara vera kbira.il hdura xi haga ikbar fiha.
A simple addition of his declared income over the years will tell you what he had at his disposal for consumption and investment. The tax compliance unit should investigate to verify whether this income tallies with the cost value of his estate including trusts he may have.
I would presume its all held in trusts registered overseas and no public will or testament would disclose the real value of his estate or assets.
True but even trusts can be broken into under court authority.
As I said a few days back Mintoff’s will is pretty useless.
The bulk of the estate is obviously overseas and it does not necessarily have to be included in the will.
One vague indication of the quantum is that when he first became PM in 1955 it was estimated that his professional fees from war damage related work alone had already reached the one million pounds sterling mark.
Considering that this was sixty years ago and that he spent next to nothing in the meantime, that is now worth around seventy million pounds sterling at compound interest.
What he ‘earned’ over and above this is mind boggling.
This is roughly what we are talking about.
For the sake of reconciliation, the PN journalists will not attempt to do anything like this. I think they will let it go. It’s a shame if nothing is done about it. I hope we hear some scandals soon.
We will see Dr Muscat backtracking and hiding his face in shame.
tad dahq intom. lol
Lovely! Your typical Mintoffjan, though he could have dressed up in a smarter fashion to go pay his respects to his ‘Salvatur’.
what about the independent journalists?
Kolla bla bajd, mid-dehra.
He must have been a very rich man.But he did not take anything with him.
It is a pity that he lived a miser’s life.
I remember my father who was a poor man but he will be remembered by all for his generosity and good deeds. That is what people talked about during his funeral.
Mintoff’s girls were given a good education in England but did not have the pleasure to enjoy his presence.
In the end they are going to be millionaires.
Daphne I am waiting to read the will. Maybe his children will get the surprise of their lives if he leaves everything to charity.
you used “Mintoff” and charity” in the same sentence.
He probably had millions stashed overseas.
At one point, there was news, soon hushed up, that Switzerland refused any more deposits.
See my earlier comment about Switzerland.
I hope that he had most of his investments in the Madoff ponzi schemes, and the balance in Lehman Brothers Stocks.
Possibly in “Swiss-woman-who-did-a-runner-when-it-was-put-in-her-name” account/s.
When Mintoff sent away the Israeli ships that berthed in B’Bugia because of bad weather, it was rumoured that Golda Meir, Israeli Prime Minister at that time, threathened to divulge Mintoff’s swiss bank accounts. All was hushed up in the end.
That would be ironic if the Commissioner of inland revenue will issue an ‘ex ufficio’ for Mintoff’s undeclared assets.
This incongruity will be a lesson to those who evade tax and show Mintoff’s true colours.
If I’m not mistaken, Montoff’s government introduced “ex ufficio”
Yes, I believe that Mintoff’s government introduced “ex ufficcio” assessments, u pprova jsallab xeba’ nies bihom.
. . . ipprova? Not only did the ‘gvern tal-haddiema’ try to crucify people with their dispicable communist ‘ex-ufficio’ strategy, the bastards totally ruined several people and destroyed their businesses. My own grandfather was one of the unfortunate victims.
Don’t forget to run a search at the court of voluntary jurisdiction for secret wills. With Mintoff being such a miser, I wouldn’t be surprised to find that he wanted to write his own will and a secret one at that. If ever requesting a copy of any form of will, present the official death certificate and not his Santa tal-mewt.
We need to know!
Dear Dafni xtahseb fuq it trans inti ajd??
[Daphne – Xejn. Dik fissazzjoni tal-irgiel hamalli, minhabba l-atmosfera li trabbew fiha u t-tip ta’ pornagrafija li jhobbu (ghall-istess raguni).]
Daphne I’m so glad you finally alluded to the REAL issue about Mintoff, which is that he pretended to be oh so man of the people whilst using Malta as the perfect vehicle to line his pockets.
It’s what’s been driving me mental about this whole Mintoff vs Church and Mintoff tana l-Indipendenza debate.
These are just political slogans and not the real issue! Mintoff made money behind everyone’s back any which way he could.
He was trading overseas with public funds whilst barring anyone in Malta from doing so. Good riddance to bad (albeit affluent) rubbish – what a hypocrite he was. A terrible man.
What about kemm qlajt zbub Daphne. U mur staqsi kemm QEDGHA TERDA ZBUB OMMOK L-INFERN. OMMOK QEDGHA TINHEXA MA’ XITAN FEJN DAQT TMUR INT L-INFERN TERDA ZBUB TAX-XJATEN
This Anonymous must be Hieronymous, the same fantasies.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/Hieronymus_Bosch_-_Last_Judgment_(fragment_of_Hell)_-_WGA02578.jpg
Anonymous
You are very ridiculous to talk like that. You show your true colours that you are Labour. Hamallu prima kwalita, hope you don’t have any children because it’s a crime to have them when you are the way you are.
Your vulgar language is terrifying.