The story that no Yana-approved hagiography will ever tell you

Published: August 25, 2012 at 6:42pm

Dom Mintoff with Lorry Sant, who had photographs that were the source of his uncontrollable power

It is at times like these that I really wish that I lived somewhere with a more efficient press.

When you conceal information from your readers on the grounds of ‘taste’ or it being ‘not right’, you are doing them – and society in general – a grave disservice.

People need all the information there is, so that they can make up their own minds about a situation.

When newspapers decide what information their readers should be allowed to have, that is self-censorship and they are presenting those readers with a picture that is false because so much crucial information is missing.

If you are not prepared to run the full story, don’t run anything at all, because a part-story is a false story.

So earlier this week, The Times carried an interview with Raymond Mintoff, brother of the recently deceased. In typical style, he wore an undervest, was unwashed, and sat in a messy room. He also wore a large gold Rolex.

The Times reported:

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.

Oh great, I thought. So Mintoff gives one brother a Rolex he doesn’t want (“Ha, hu din”) and meanwhile he conducts a long affair with his other brother’s wife.

And Raymond Mintoff talks about how generous his brother Dom was, while all the while he knows what Dom did to their other brother. And the press fails to put this generosity in context.

I just cannot stand this sickening, lousy hypocrisy for one second longer. The fact that Dom Mintoff cuckolded his own brother over a long period of time is not only of public interest because it gives us more insight into just how vile this man was. The bond between brothers is supposed to be inalienable. What sort of man cuckolds his own brother?

But it is especially of public interest because it had public consequences for Malta and was responsible in great part for the rise of Lorry Sant and the disintegration of the Labour government into terrible corruption and abuse.

Lorry Sant had in his possession compromising photographs of Wenzu Mintoff’s mother (the sister-in-law in question) which were clearly taken at Dom’s summer house at Delimara, L-Gharix.

We will probably never know how Sant got hold of those photographs. What we do know is that he used them to blackmail and threaten Dom Mintoff and that this was his hold over him. It why Mintoff couldn’t control Lorry Sant and allowed him to do as he pleased.

Unfortunately, we discovered this only in 1991, when Labour had been out of government for four years. While Labour was in government, we wondered why Lorry Sant was the only man of whom Mintoff was frightened, and who rose to the status of an uncontrollable robber baron because of that.

In 1991, Lorry Sant rose in parliament and amid a lot of shouting in Wenzu Mintoff’s direction (the latter had resigned the Labour whip and held his seat for AD) waved a brown envelope about.

He said that the contents of this envelope would focus Wenzu Mintoff’s mind.

The Speaker of the House asked to look inside the envelope when it was placed on the table of the house. Wenzu Mintoff did so too, and recognised his mother naked at L-Gharix.

In the shock of the moment, he suddenly understood why, when he was a child, his mother was never at home on Wednesdays. Mintoff did not go into the office on Wednesdays. That was his custom.

The Speaker ordered that the envelope and its contents be locked up securely. Wherever it was locked up, it is either still there or has been spirited away, but who cares at this stage. We know now what was in it. Nobody wants to see the actual photographs. It would be prurient.

We also know that neither the facts of this matter nor the photographs will be included in the official biography of Dom Mintoff, which will be Yana-approved.

When Dom Mintoff’s brother discovered that he had been having an affair with his wife, he went to see him at L-Gharix and they came to blows.

Dom Mintoff was struck about the head and face with a hard object, and when he appeared in public with visible signs of that encounter, the excuse given was that he had come off his horse.

This is what I mean about the weakness of the press in Malta. Mintoff’s affair with his brother’s wife made Lorry Sant’s uncontrollable corruption and abuse possible, through blackmail.

Imagine a British prime minister having a prolonged affair with his brother’s wife and the press keeping quiet about it, even after it becomes obvious that a key minister in that prime minister’s cabinet had compromising photographs of the affair and was using them for blackmail and intimidation.

Lots of things happen and have happened in Malta only because the press is and was hopelessly inadequate.

Instead of interviewing Raymond Mintoff about the gold Rolex his brother gave him, the press should be telling readers about the consequences for Malta of Dom Mintoff being unable to keep his pants on, not even around his own brother’s wife.




202 Comments Comment

  1. sandy:) says:

    Robert Musumeci
    9 hours ago via mobile
    Illum, jien li ma nidentifkax lili nnifsi mal-politika socjalista tal-passat, insellem lil perit Mintoff li matul hajti ltqajt mieghu diversi drabi u dejjem wrieni rispett.

    • A Montebello says:

      Thank you Mintoff for not being disrespectful to me? Really?

    • Libertas says:

      Is-suġġett dejjem jibqa’ Musumeci. L-aqwa li Musumeci qala’ rispett minn wieħed li miet. Ieħor mimli bih innifsu.

      • mc says:

        Ma jidentifikax ruhu mal-politika socjalista tal-passat imma ma’ tal-prezent iva mid-dehra.

      • Jozef says:

        Perit jekk joghgbok, halli mohhu biss biex iwahhal railings f’kull tarag li hemm il-Belt, ma’ tmurx tehodlu xi wahda ghal-sormha.

      • ego trip says:

        U avukat in the making, please! Ghax mhux kuntent bi professjoni wahda.

    • ciccio says:

      “jien li ma nidentifkax lili nnifsi mal-politika socjalista tal-passat”

      Hmmm. Does he identify himself with the socialist policies of the present? And what policies exactly would those be, anyway?

      • ego trip says:

        Ciccio, all he cares is about being super successful in his profession. He would never take a stand to disappoint his supposed political enemies if that meant jeopardising his professional status. That is the Musumeci syndrome.

    • Norwegian Wood says:

      All right me xxxx you Jack. Prosit Musumeci.

  2. Peter Mallia says:

    Thank you for this, Daphne. Thank God there’s someone like you in Malta.

  3. village says:

    Madam, well done for this post. This information alone should have been be enough reason not to hold a state funeral. What a disgrace and a miserable person he is who cuckolds his own brother.

    • clayton says:

      if it was not for mintof u wouldnt have a place of job because women couldnt work vote so shyut up respecgt a guy that made malta that is now

      [Daphne – Mintoff made Malta what it is now. Yes, right you are. Jahasra kemm ma tafu xejn. Mur arakom toqghodu Malta qabel l-1987, kemm kontu tgorru u tibku kieku.]

      • Thrower says:

        Daphne, the only reason why you and your munchkins hate Mintoff is because you come from filthy rich families who did not give a damn about the worker’s suffering. And then Mintoff, rightly so, decided to make the rich pay higher taxes so he can have more money to spend on benefits for the workers. The workers, previously stupid, now started to attend school and universities and started to integrate more with you rich people, and so a middle class was formed, something which you people hate dearly! So there, hope you have a response to that!

        [Daphne – Right you are! We were all filthy rich and we oppressed the workers. KEMM MA TAF XEJN, IDJOTA. U tghid Mintoff ma ghamilx il-middle class? Mamma mia, it’s so bloody obvious that you weren’t around. X’tahseb? Li kien jezisti Paceville b’hafna bars u nightclubs halli jkunu jistghu jinzlu hemm in-nies mil-irhula? Li kien hemm salt hwienet tal-hwejjeg biex tkun tista tixtri x’tilbes ghall-weekend? Li t-toroq kienu mimlijin karozzi? Anke fl-1986, kont nara nies qishom hargu minn xi film tal-biza, dwar xi post mwarrab fl-Amerika, bilkemm jafu jitkellmu u jimxu. Jew jinzlu jghumu liebsin par jeans ghaliex ma kellomx malja. Hallini, tridx. Jien ghaddejt minn dak iz-zmien u naf x’qeghda nghid.]

      • ciccio says:

        Thrower, Here’s the middle class of 1986.

        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hS6c6cYjMh8&feature=related

        Tal-ostja, man. Kullhadd, hekk, meqrud.

      • Josette Jones says:

        If it were for Mintoff, you wouldn’t have a bloody computer in the first place, let alone the Internet connection you are using to announce your block-headed ignorance to the masses.

        Mintoff told you that a computer was just a ‘kaxxa wires’. Now I’m quite sure he didn’t really believe that himself, but that’s what he wanted everyone to think because he did not want the people to benefit from the technology and better themselves. And most of all, he definitely did not want anything like the kind of access to information and freedom of speech that we have today.

        So if you really respect Mintoff like you say you do, maybe you should be the one to shut up, turn off your computer and vanish from the online world. It’s the way i-lPerit would have wanted.

      • Thrower says:

        for your information, Mintoff Intoduced the Computer Centre in the mid 80s, which you fascists exploded with a bomb.

      • Maryanne (2?) says:

        Ah but people who wanted a computer would need an import licence stamped from numerous departments, including wireless telegraphy lest, God forbid, you attach a tuner to it and it becomes a – *shock horror* – colour TV.

        And then your name would be crossed off the electoral register so that you could never ever import another computer in that household (unless the licence had the minister’s initials on top, that is).

        You would have had a serious problem with trying to insult this blogger without Internet and a computer, don’t you think. Smartphone? What smartphone? After years of waiting you could probably get a land line and every time you make a call you would hear another 3 conversations going on.

      • Macduff says:

        Jiehu l-flus m’ghand min jahdem ghalihom, biex itihom f’ “benefitttsss” u “rilijf” lil “haddiema”. Jaqq, x’mentalita’.

        You may be surprised to know that:

        1. Mintoff made it near impossible to get into Univeristy. A whole generation of young people were wasted in the skejjel tas-snajja, whatever they were.

        2. Mintoff turned the Malta Univeristy, an old and once-prestigious institution into a mere polytechnic. Ever heard of the student-haddiem?

        3. Mintoff tried to destroy the Church schools, while sending his own children to a boarding school run by, surprise surprise… nuns. No, you couldn’t choose were to educate your children, but he could.

        4. Mintoff wrought havoc in Malta’s healthcare system. He threw Maltese doctors and medical students out of St Luke’s, for resisting his manouevres to manipulate the Medical Council. He closed down private hospitals. The result? A chronic shortage of doctors that lasted for over a decade.

        5. Mintoff put Malta’s name on the map, sure, but for the wrong reasons. Cuba in the Mediterrean? Ghaddafi’s trojan horse? We could have done without that. Even his admirers admit his foreign policy was opportunistic, without realizing that it reflects bad on the man himself.

        I could go on, but I won’t. I suppose it’s lost on you, anyway.

      • Il-Hajbu says:

        @ Josett Jones

        Hawwadntni Josett!! Jigifieri inti qeghdha tghid li Mintoff ried li l-

        poplu Malti ikollu komputer?

      • Jozef says:

        Thrower, will you stop repeating Joseph’s Sunday revision class?

        ‘The workers, previously stupid….’ how did you manage to put it down in writing without realisng that it’s your lot who won’t respect a category by default?

        As for workers, I suppose in your book, doctors, teachers, shopkeepers, entrepreneurs aren’t.

        Bloody ludicruous in your thinking by numbers, no spcae for discernment, detail and real analysis. Get real and stop wasting my time.

    • Randon says:

      I do not think that these private indiscretions of Mr Mintoff, whether true or not, should distract us from his political persona and achievements.

      After all, Signor Berlusconi has done much worse than Mintoff in this department and many French pesidents (and Bourbon kings before them) maintained a mistress, sometimes in full view of the court. In fact, their people would view them wih suspicion if they failed to keep a mistress!

      You are not sensible when you impose a narrow Anglo-Saxon (puritanical) frame of mind to Mediterranean context.

      [Daphne – Try to justify it, will you. I don’t think any of them conducted affairs with their brother’s wife, and if they had put themselves in a position where they could be blackmailed, it would be all over the news and resignation would be immediate. The fact that it was with his brother’s wife made the blackmail possible. I don’t think Mintoff would have been at all worried about his supporters finding out that he had slept with any other woman – it would have been a sign of his hot-blooded masculinity, given the way you lot think. Imma r-ragel ta’ huh? Forget it. His supporters wouldn’t have thought much of that, and I don’t blame them.]

      • Randon says:

        I am not at all approving of Mr Mintoff’s private behaviour, if such behaviour were proved to be true. But your sanctimonious judgement of this man is really misplaced and quite Medieval.

        Are we sure that in the past decade PN ministers did not have mistresses (including next of kin) or perhaps homosexual relations? Probably they did, but we do not give a damn. The British would raise an eyebrow to such relations, but they have a (hypocritical) puritanical streak which we do not share with.

        Just keep in mind that this nation has voted in divorce to the disapproval of the PM. Some may argue that moral decline is a reproach to any nation, but I do not think this is the case of Malta. It is just human nature unbound from excessive and controlling mores of religion and superstition. Mr Mintoff surpassed these trivial local mores (which our uninspiring PM remains subject to), just as he surpassed so many others in political vision and achievements.

        I would be quite disappointed if Mr Mintollf did not keep a mistress. It would have been remiss of him and quite contrary to the anti-establishment views he expressed so vividly in public!

        Daphne, you obviously hate this man but do not let this blind you into making a fool of yourself.

        [Daphne – “I would be quite disappointed if Mr Mintoff did not keep a mistress”. Very progressive and respectful of women. “It would have been quite contrary to the anti-establishment views he expressed vividly in public”. To the contrary, keeping mistresses is wholly establishment, old-fashioned and ultra-conservative.]

      • Jozef says:

        Get a grip, Berlusconi was grilled by the media for rendering himself liable to the pimps and their escorts.

      • Randon says:

        In that case you should tell that to our conservative PM. Meanwhile, I will re-phrase what I wrote as ‘I would be quite disappointed if Dr Gonzi did not keep a mistress’.

        If he approves what you write he might well take up a mistress (to the disdain of Kate, who certainly does not deserve that) and finally fulfill his destiny at being the most ‘wholly establishment, old-fashioned and ultra-conservative’ PM in Malta’s history.

        Thank you for giving us the right words to describe our PM.

        [Daphne – You do realise that the turn of phrase ‘keeps a mistress’ is in exactly the same category as ‘keeps a dog’, ‘keeps a carriage’, and ‘keeps horses’, I trust? Truly progressive. Lawrence Gonzi is not conservative. His policies tend more towards the left of centre.]

      • Randon says:

        The choice of words, ‘keeps a mistress’ is quite appropriate. He would have to hide her like a rabid dog not to cause scandal with his fellow members of the Azzjoni Kattolika.

        [Daphne – It’s not appropriate for many reasons. Apart from the political (with a small p) connotations, Mintoff wouldn’t even keep his wife, let alone a mistress. Having sex with a woman who is not your wife does not constitute ‘keeping a mistress’. Keeping a mistress means exactly what it says: a man literally ‘keeps’ a woman – in other words, he maintains her financially, in return for having a relationship with her.]

        As for your statement that ‘Lawrence Gonzi is not conservative. His policies tend more towards the left of centre’, I wonder if you kow the facts: A member of Azzjoni Kattolika leading a Parliamentary Group that includes membes of Opus Dei and a minister who was an avid reader of Mein Kampf during his days at university. Very left of centre, indeed.

        [Daphne – Tal-biki. Literalment tal-biki. As though you can’t be left-wing and also religious. To broaden the scope of the welfare safety net and free education you’ve got to be an atheist and insult the church on a regular basis, right? Ma, x’injoranza.]

  4. canon says:

    Dom Mintoff always showed respect until you disagreed with him.

    • Min Jaf says:

      Thrower, Josette Jones is right. You are wrong.

      The computer centre at Swatar Dingli was there to enable the totalitarian Mintoff government better to keep tabs on the people.

      But the people were prohibited from using, let alone owning, even the most basic computer. And that also included private businesses to the ultimate detriment of employment of the workers whom uneducated nit brains like Thrower are somehow still convinced that Mintoff kien ihobb lil-haddiem.

      Like hell he did.

      The workers, and all of Mintoff’s supporters were there solely to be used to enable him and his thugs to hold on to power.

  5. silvio says:

    The million dollar question is, who else apart from the Speaker and Wenzu Mintoff saw the photos?

    Could this be one of the many fairy tailes we have heard on the private of Dom MIntoff?

    [Daphne – Oh sorry. I left out a crucial bit of information. After this major scene in parliament, I had a telephone call from Saviour Balzan, who wasn’t yet a journalist. Could he bring his friend and fellow AD member, Wenzu Mintoff, over to my house to speak to me? We sat down in my kitchen and Wenzu told me what the photos were, and what they meant. So I have it from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.]

    The version I heard was that Gonzi was than Speaker, and had them destroyed. The other version was that they were stolen from the Speaker’s safe.

    The other question is, how do we know that Wenzu Mintoff was shocked and realised why his mother was always away on Wednesdays? I’m sure he didn’t tell anybody.
    Quite far fetched.

    [Daphne – Yes, Silvio. He told me.]

    • Charles says:

      Daphne, seeing that the photos involved his own mother, what was Wenzu Mintoff’s aim/reason in revealing them to you?

      [Daphne – To ask me not to write about it. The thing is, I didn’t know until he told me. And then I didn’t write about it for 20 years, because in that situation I had no choice. I wouldn’t have been able to do so anyway. My editor at The Sunday Times would never have allowed it. it was very frustrating.]

      • Peter Mifsud says:

        Daphne,

        Excellent piece :) but I’m curious.

        Did you ever interview (or try to ) Wenzu’s dad or mum or try to get their side of the story? Are you at liberty to divulge? I suspect there’s more to Lorry Sant’s hold on Mintoff.

        Keep up the good work.

    • Qeghdin Sew says:

      From what you explained, kienet falza stikka nobis ta’ Saviour.

    • Antoniette says:

      For all those who think Daphne is employed by the P.N, this should make it crystal clear that she is not.

      If she was working for the P.N. this would have been out much earlier.

      And another thing, what hypocrisy from Mintoffjani Saviour Balzan and Wenzu Mintoff, they go to Daphne when they need something from her and then vilify her when it suits them.

      [Daphne – I can’t follow that line of reasoning. And in any case, I’ve written about this several times. It’s just that people only find Mintoff topical this week.]

    • Ian says:

      Saviour Balzan? So shouldn’t this be some MaltaToday scoop? Now that Mintoff is topical again…

    • carlos says:

      The Speaker was Dr JImmy Farrugia and he locked them in the drawer of his desk.

      He surely kept there for some time and later handed them over to Dr. Gonzi. From then on only Gonzi can say.

      What I can say is that Dr Farrugia was terribly shocked and if I may say so, afraid of what to do with them.

      I know all this because I worked in Parliament at that time.

    • hehehe says:

      when there is proof we believe. guilty until proven right. anyone could say anything on anyone. creative writing it is called.

      [Daphne – Look at you all, clutching at straws so that you don’t have to absorb the horrible knowledge about your hero. PATHETIC.]

  6. The other Dom says:

    The below is rich isn’t it ?
    I reckon he’s just got himself 1835 clients if you ever decide to go after those aholes who commented on your page. And that would include criminal action by the police for grevious intent of bodily harm.

    Face book post by Emmanuel Mallia
    CRIMINAL CODE OF MALTA.

    82A. (1) Whosoever uses any threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or displays any written or printed material which is threatening, abusive or insulting, or otherwise conducts himself in such a manner, with intent thereby to stir up violence or hatred against another person or group on the grounds of gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, race, colour, language, ethnic origin, religion or belief or political or other opinion or whereby such violence or racial hatred is likely, having regard to all the circumstances, to be stirred up shall, on conviction, be liable to imprisonment for a term from six to eighteen months.

    • ta' sapienza says:

      What do you call a class action in reverse?

    • ciccio says:

      That Article has some important conditions, like “having regard to all the circumstances” and “on conviction.” Surely, with a criminal lawyer like Emmanuel Mallia by one’s side, one would be able to overcome those hurdles, easily.

      • Lomax says:

        The important words in that article are the following: “with intent thereby to stir up violence or hatred against…”

        These words show the specific intent to stir up violence or hatred.

        We all know that Mallia’s quoting the Criminal Code was not intended to teach us, poor plebs, the Criminal Code but rather to shut Daphne up (minn ghalih).

        Fact is, however, that it is bleeding obvious, even to the most idiotic of readers, that Daphne’s words are not written with that intent. On the contrary. Daphne’s words are clearly aimed at expressing herself and expressing what she feels in the present circumstances, molded, of course, by her past.

        Hence, she does not give two hoots whether we will become enamoured with Mintoff through her words or whether we will hate him even more. What she cares about – hence, her intent, to use the legal jargon – is to express her feelings and sentiments.

        She has every right to do so and, frankly, if we, her readers, feel the same way, it does not mean that Daphne wrote what she wrote with the intent to stir up violence.

        When an article in the Criminal Code speaks of the “specific intent” to achieve some aim, should there not be enough evidence that that intent actually existed at the time of consumption of the offence, then the crime/contravention cannot subsist. This is different to the writing of extreme rightists, for example, whose sole aim is to incite hatred and violence against ethnic minorities.

        This is the fundamental difference and, even though I do not have the Criminal Code open in front of me, the fact that that Article has the letter capital A, it shows that it was a recent addition which therefore means that it was intended, primarily, to address racist writings and representations aimed at promoting racial hatred.

        In conclusion, what Mallia is claiming is, in my very humble opinion, unfounded in law and in fact. And Mallia knows this but when a lawyer becomes embroiled in politics out of opportunism rather than a wish to be really of service, his judgment becomes obfuscated to the extent that he utters legal garbage.

      • ciccio says:

        Lomax, I do agree with what you say.

  7. joseph says:

    I dont mind about personal affairs of others. What s interested me is that Mintoff gave me enough money to be able to raise my family in a decent way.

    [Daphne – You miss the point, even though it was spelled out. This particular affair was of concern to you or your parents, and remains of concern to us today, because it gave Lorry Sant the means to blackmail Mintoff and build a small fiefdom on corruption. “Mintoff gave me money” – pathetic. How about you work for your money? And Mintoff didn’t give you his money. He gave you other people’s money – and land.]

  8. U-turns u Kutrumbajsi says:

    I would just like to point out that this article doesn’t include entirely the full story too.

    The fact that the Speaker of the house, who received and lock up the said photos, is today’s Prime-minister was left out.

    We do not know what part this played in the past, if any, and neither if still plays any part today.

    However, it should be up to the readers to judge and form opinions based on the full information, as you rightly put it – which I fully agree with you for. This is the only reason why I am pointing this out.

    [Daphne – How is it relevant or significant? Please explain.]

    • Joe Citizen says:

      Isn’t it obvious Dear Daphne… jew int l-ovvju ma tarahx meta jkun blue…. mela let me spell it out for you…. The Speaker, today’s PM, knew about the blackmail and did nothing about it!

      [Daphne – OK, I’ll speak really slowly so that you can understand me. The existence of these photographs was revealed in 1991. In 1991, Labour had been out of government for four years. Lorry Sant was not a cabinet minister. Therefore he had no scope for blackmail (oh dear, ‘scope’ – that might be difficult). So by the time the existence of the photographs was revealed to the Speaker, they were entirely useless as the means of blackmail. And that’s why Lorry Sant had no problem giving up his secret weapon. Because it was a weapon no longer.]

      • Joe Citizen says:

        Daphne, an educated person doesn’t ridicule or abuse others so my conculsion is that in spite of the fact that you were educated at the Convent of the Sacred Heart, you are still a hamalla mill-kbar!

        PS: since blackmail is blackmail I would have expected you to say that the Speaker shoud have reported the matter to the Police Commissioner. Since Lorry Sant presented the material to parliament, I’m sure he had a motive for doing so…. so no, he did have a reason to give up his secret weapon and it’s called moral violence.

        [Daphne – I was at the Convent of the Sacred Heart. I was at St Dorothy’s Convent in Mdina. Opinion is free, but facts are sacred.]

  9. U-turns u Kutrumbajsi says:

    Unless I am wrong about that actually. But i recall reading it in one of your other articles.

    Thanks.

  10. Rigor Mortis says:

    And this is the man whose slandered Paul Boffa with accusations of incest.

  11. Min Weber says:

    Isn’t it strange that many of the protagonists of the 70s and 80s are all dying at the same time – despite the difference in their ages.

    Censu Tabone, de Marco, Mintoff, Peter Serracino Inglott – this seems to me the closing of an era.

  12. Ken il malti says:

    Hmmm, this story of the blackmailing photos is very similar to the compromising photos of J. Edgar Hoover that were in possession of mafiosi Meyer Lansky and Sam Giancana.

    Hoover never admitted that the Mafia exists in his whole long career as head of the FBI.

    The blackmailing photos supposedly showed the closeted homosexual J. Edgar Hoover performing a sex act on another male.

  13. verita says:

    Sant was a minister of public works but later was given the role of interior minister . In a few months time he was back as minister of public works for obvious reasons his favourite .Wonder why the change after just a few months Could the photos made all the difference ?

  14. Anthony says:

    What did you expect him to do?

    Relieve himself with a whore? Or a mistress?

    Whores cost money. Mistresses even more.

    Sisters-in-law are on the house.

    Filthy and disgusting.

    He now needs a ton of rosary beads not just one.

    • Josette Jones says:

      Very insightful. I think you are spot on.

    • Lilla says:

      You forgot the maid – Il-Fusellu’s mother.

      He was already paying her to clean his house, so he got a bargain there too.

      • Anthony says:

        Paying her to clean his house ? You must be joking Lilla.

        He arranged for her husband to have medical treatment abroad at government expense. He also got him a job back in Malta.

        In return Mrs Bondin cleaned his house.

  15. The chemist says:

    Wenzu Mintoff was on super one today reminiscing about how he watched the 1970 world cup with his uncle Dom. Wonder why he forgot to mention what else he had to watch later on in life. Maybe Yana consoled him and explained that all that happened was in the interest of the country.

    • Min Jaf says:

      Well, one thing is for sure. The game they were watching was not being played on a Wednesday.

      • shut up says:

        these are ppls personal lives,would you likeall your dirty laundry aired??

        [Daphne – Actually, no, it’s not your personal life when it has a direct impact on your public life. Don’t be so damned idiotic. Mur arak toqghod l-Italja u tiddefendi l-private life ta’ Berlusconi.]

      • The chemist says:

        1970 was in Mexico so the games were shown here late. Wednesday was as good as any other. Morning sex then late night football.

  16. The chemist says:

    Update……http://m.maltatoday.com.mt/newsdetails/news/national/Dom-Mintoff-must-be-seen-within-the-context-of-his-time-20120825

    So that’s it, context of time.

    It was OK at the time to hump your own brother’s wife. Simple really. Had to be Saviour to point out this fact to us dimwits.

    • Min Jaf says:

      Oh, chemist I see. Then Mintoff was indeed a sport-loving man. Fil-ghodhu jilabulu bil-bocci – mur ara kemm kien iggebbed l-ispaga biex iwassala lejn il-lick eh u aktar tard jarhom jilabu bil- veru 8prosit, hej.

    • maryanne says:

      Do they judge Nerik Mizzi, Archbishop Gonzi and Borg Olivier in the context of their times?

  17. sasha says:

    At Min Weber with regards to the closing of an era. Unfortunately I disagree with you, as a number of the then politicians who caused so much trouble are going to contest the next elections under new labour.

  18. Stephen Borg Fiteni says:

    “People need all the information there is, so that they can make up their own minds about a situation.”

    I started to give up on that after seeing the thousands of people at Mintoff’s funeral.

  19. Stephen Borg Fiteni says:

    Although to be fair, it is thanks to this blog and the research I did online that led me to hate Mintoff, I just wish other people would be able to see it.

  20. Thrower says:

    Another rubbish and baseless article full of hatred by Malta’s Most Hated. If this were a true story, this would have been headline news for like 3 years, and rest assured that politicians will be still attacking Mintoff about this ‘scandal’. And also, wouldn’t Raymond be furious with his brother if this were a true story? But, all this did not happen. So please, Daphne, get a better thing to do than lying on the internet, who your only believers are a couple of fascist rats, and jeolous people, I beg you.

    [Daphne – Not Raymond, but Wenzu Mintoff’s father. And yes, it happened. Don’t be childish and desperate. My point, given that you don’t seem to have got it, is that this being Malta, it WASN’T headline news.]

    • Min Jaf says:

      The ‘photographs’ incident is documented in the parliamentary records. It is also recorded in The Times report covering that parliamentary session.

      Lorry Sant had, in the previous session, threatened Wenzu Mintoff that he would lay on the table of the house information that would be damaging to Wenzu and then proceeded to do so in the session under review.

      Lorry flashed the photos in front of Wenzu, then placed them on the table where they were duly documented, whereupon the Speaker, Lawrence Gonzi, immediately sealed the photos in an envelope to be retained in parliamentary records.

      Incidentally, Lorry Sant habitually disrupted parliamentary proceedings throughout his parliamentary career.

      He was finally brought to order by Speaker Gonzi who suspended Lorry Sant from the House for three weeks, taking the crap out of Lorry once and for all.

    • Anthony says:

      This is the huge problem facing this tiny country of ours.

      Too many people live in denial.

      Not just because they are stupid (which they undoubtedly are) but for convenience. Because it suits them.

      In Malta calling a spade a spade is just not on.

      Ma tarax.

      • MickeyMouse says:

        Il-gid u mhabba ta’ Mintoff f’mohh dawn in-nies li hafna minnhom stess saru ‘nies’ fi zmien il-PN u xorta wahda jibqghu joholmu fuq iz-zmien ta ‘hakma’ Laburista.

        Dawn huma nies li ghandhom pozizzjoniet importanti anki f’kumpaniji privati u prominenti u jaqilghu eluf kbar ta’ flus fis-sena, izda jkomplu jmaqdru lil PN.

        Bilhaqq skond Joseph Muscat u il-PL il-Maltin qed imutu bil-guh ukoll….qed nara jien.

  21. GB says:

    Viva l-perit, u min jaf kemm ghad irridu nisimghu iktar fuqu. Prosit Daphne.

  22. salvino says:

    Alfred Sant has been invisible these last few days.

  23. Karl Cucciardil says:

    Gideb biss!

  24. WhoamI? says:

    Isma Debono Grech

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPK63h8Jzh0&feature=related

    go straight to 1:07 and wait 4 seconds.

    A member of your government in waiting

  25. Dad's Army says:

    Rosary beads and a Catholic state funeral for a very bad man.

    • Libertas says:

      It was really all a lie. Thise rosary beads and mass in St John’s Cathedral. Those who really knew the man must have laughed.

      • ciccio says:

        “Those who really knew the man must have laughed.”

        I did not know the man. And I laughed.

  26. MINTOFF THE LEGEND says:

    il-qahba (bil-provi) mill-li jkollha ttik

  27. Carmel says:

    No need to read anything ..but coming from Daphne ..only shit comes out of a Scum’s mouth!!!

  28. TROY says:

    Issa nistenew li jinqara it-testment, halli nkunu nafu kemm kellu tfal Duminku u izjed u izjed kemm halla flus.

    Dan mhux suppost li halla hafna flus, ghax miskin kien bniedem umli u dejjem qassam il-ftit flus li kien jaqla lill foqra. Ghalekk nahseb li Yana miskina qadet tigi minn l-Amerika ghal xejn, u issa se jkollha taghmel gabra sabiex tigbor ghal passagg lura lejn lis-States.

    Kemm kien ragel umli il-perit u kemm hadem ghal Malta miskin.

    • Gwynne says:

      U r one dumb BROAD Daphne, were u born with a silver spoon in your mouth BITCH, and by the way SPEAKING about FREE SPEECH, how’s come u never POST my remarks, u r one IGNORANT and STUPID bitch, just because u went to University or wherever u’ve been, does not make u smarter then other people FOOL. Go ahead, post this MESSAGE I dare u .!!!

      • el bandido guapo says:

        Wow, that was one hell of a meaningful contribution, Gwynne. I so enjoyed reading it.

        Keep it up, keep them coming. Preferably elsewhere.

      • TinaB says:

        Daphne dared you – she posted your very intelligent “MESSAGE”.

        Now what?

      • miki says:

        @gwynne.
        oh dear. “dumb”, “ignorant”, “fool” and “stupid”. Gwynne, you should not be on this forum. It is dangerous. It is like letting kids play with sharp knives.
        It is beyond you, really.
        Go back to Bormla and do not try to overwork the few, remaining, undamaged brain cells you have left, again.
        And turn your computer off. You are wasting electricity.

      • TROY says:

        She’s certainly smarter than you Gwynne, because the message was posted.

      • ray says:

        You just proved why your messages are not posted. Illiterate twat.

    • Anthony says:

      The will is completely irrelevant here.

      The loot is stashed away……

      Ask the Mossad.

  29. Mr Azzopardi says:

    Choke on this Daphne!
    from your dear brothers and sisters in the UK.

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/dom-mintoff-pugnacious-prime-minister-of-malta-who-fought-for-liberation-from-british-colonial-rule-8073608.html

    [Daphne – Ah. You think it flattering. Or perhaps even admiring.]

    • Malta Mafia says:

      In Britain, however, he kept his old friends.

      In February 1970 Dick Crossman, by then Lord President of the Council, took him to dinner at the Garrick Club, where afterwards, as a clearly intrigued Crossman recounted in his diaries, “Dom was collected by three shady looking figures. He is a little party power boss, powerful, shrewd, intensely intellectual. He is part of the Malta Mafia.”

    • IMHO says:

      “Dom was collected by three shady looking figures. He is a little party power boss, powerful, shrewd, intensely intellectual. He is part of the Malta Mafia.”

      Ghandkom b’xiex tiftahru.

    • Henry Mifsud says:

      Yes both flattering and admiring.

      [Daphne – More fool you, then. You actually believe that British writers of obituaries, like Maltese effing hamalli, admire men who are picked up from the Garrick Club by three louts, and you even believe that being described as a member of the Maltese Mafia is flattering. God bless you. You live in a world of your own.]

      One does not need to stoop so low Daphne to get noticed.

      [Daphne – I don’t need to get noticed. I have had nothing but since the age of 25, to the point where I actually don’t know what normal life and anonymity are because I have never really had them as an adult. This may have escaped your attention. The fascinating thing is that there is a whole new generation out there who regard me as a freshly arrived phenomenon, failing to realise that it is they who are freshly arrived on the scene and that my presence in public lie predates them by at least two decades. That’s intelligence for you.]

      If you think that we were not around in those times and even before, you are truly mistaken. But then we don’t have to write the garbage you do.

      [Daphne – No. Instead you teach at an institution set up by the Nationalist Party in government and spend your days spouting rubbish on your Facebook wall. Why don’t you write garbage on a blog instead? It’s far more satisfying than Facebook. But then you have to write longer sentences.]

      If one had to start recounting stories which truly happened about the private life of the PM prior to Mintoff, your story would be a fairy tale in comparison. But we know better and we are surely more prudent.

      So even though you must find it so irritating, one must admit that the conclusion (which I am reproducing for the benefit of those who might have missed it) says it all:
      “His foes were only too happy to see the back of a man they regarded as a scheming bully with totalitarian tendencies. His allies as well often found Mintoff quite maddening: impatient, self-centred, and domineering. But indubitably he was a patriot, who more than any other individual, and largely by the force of his own personality, was responsible for the independent Malta of today. Rupert Cornwell”

      [Daphne – Read between the lines. As for ‘responsible for independent Malta’, you know for a fact that he wasn’t. Malta gained independence in 1964.]

      • Pecksniff says:

        Henry Mifsud: Now at ITS, once at BOV but left under a cloud, “tal-borom”.

        [Daphne – Yes, I know. Imbasta joqghod jghid kontra l-gvern u favur Mintoff. Kien ikollu ITS u Facebook kieku taht dak il-qammiel. I find these people utterly fascinating as case studies. I mean, do they actually look around them now and think “Hmmm, life under Mintoff was so much better.” What the hell are they. Stockholm Syndrome wahda sew. Kieku kien xi wiehed illiterat minn xi slum, kont nghid iva, forsi m’ghandux tort jahseb hekk.]

      • Henry Mifsud says:

        Thank you Daphne for your compliments. Rest assured that should I decide to have my own blog I would treat much more mind-provoking subjects than you do. Believe me I can write much longer than you think :)

        But for the moment I shall continue to dedicate my time by transferring essential “intelligence” (as in the context you put it) to my students. And at times add a spicy comment on Facebook which apparently caught your attention, even though we are not “friends”. I know we have some mutual friends though and by golly I’m sure that they can really tell the difference between you and me.

        As to your concluding remark, any international observer worth his salt knows well enough that Malta got its independence in 1964 ….. on paper! But everyone (even those who don’t want to admit it) knows that The real independence i.e. when it became liberated, happened on 31st March 1979. Period!

        [Daphne – You’re very uninformed for a teacher. So shall I spell out the facts as they happened? 1. The British financial year ends on 31 March. 2. Britain’s leases on military bases run from 1 April to 31 March, following the financial year. 3. Britain’s lease on its military base in Malta expired on 31 March 1979. 4. Britain thought it might as well renew the lease, but only on the same terms and for the same money. 5. Mintoff asked for much more money. 6. Britain told him to go and fuck himself (politely). 7. Mintoff begged and hollered and tried to use all manner of persuasion techniques. 8. Britain said it would renew only on the same terms. 9. Mintoff did not want to lose face with the British by backing down from his demands. 10. The British packed up and left, issuing instructions that absolutely nothing was to be left behind, down to the last screw and socket. 11. Mintoff panicked. Overnight, he found himself without the income from the lease and worse than that, with an entire naval dockyard that had become instantly redundant, yet with thousands of salaries that had to be paid, plus thousands of others more who had been directly or indirectly employed through the military base and who were either already or about to be out of work. 12. Mintoff rings Gaddafi. 13. Gaddafi gives him money and promises aid, but with many strings attached. 14. A desperate Mintoff agrees to everything and Gaddafi becomes the only head of state other than Malta’s to attend the ‘freedom’ ceremony which bound us as his vassals. 15. The dockyard becomes a burden on Malta for the next three decades, sucking up hundreds of millions of liri in taxpayer’s funds.]

        If you feel that people like me are utterly fascinating as case studies, what about you and your ilk? It takes a sinister mind to think of Stockholm Syndrome in this context. But then you always gave me the impression that you like bonding or better still bondage lol One thing is certain, you do not suffer from battered-wife syndrome, do you?

        [Daphne – Are you entirely certain that it is appropriate or even permissible for a lecturer and the state hotel management and catering college to be writing this way on the internet? I suppose you are one of those people who, if reprimanded after a complaint is filed against you (not by me; I merely think you pitiful), will protest about political discimination instead of facing the fact that you a complete arsehole who shouldn’t be trusted around students.]

      • Natalie says:

        Subtlety is missed on these people. The British often avoid confrontation; however they manage to deliver their message with great diplomacy.

        Although describing a man as “domineering”, “bully”, and “mafia boss”, does not leave much room for confusion to what the writer is trying to say.

        [Daphne – If you’re a Mintoffian, you’ll think that flattery and admiration.]

      • The chemist says:

        I suggest you don’t show this to your students who are probably more open minded than you are Henry. Kif jghid il-Malti, taghtek tkaxkira papali. U timbru li se jibqaghlek, ‘Is Sir Arsehole ‘

      • Henry Mifsud says:

        Is this a threat Daphne? Reprimanded for what?

        [Daphne – No, Mr Mifsud (we haven’t been introduced) it’s not a threat. As I said, I couldn’t be bothered with scum like you. It’s a statement of fact. People in your situation, lecturerrs and so on, are expected by the better members of the public and also their employers to behave in an appropriate manner on the internet. Let’s say my son was one of your students. How comfortable would he feel knowing that his lecturer is a Mintoffjan ahdar who hates his mother, and that this Mintoffjan ahdar has posted his feeings about his mother and her politics all over Facebook, her blog and other parts of the internet? It’s not enough for you to keep your feelings to yourself in the ITS building when you then plaster them in cyberspace. You represent the institution you work for. Whenever you say something cracked about politics, like cyber fan mail for Mintoff, people say ‘Dak mhux lecturer l-ITS?’ Nice. It’s the same with senior managers at, say, HSBC, plastering their Mintoff fanaticism all over Facebook when they have access to the financial information of those who hate Mintoff. I reminds me of Mid Med and BOV days under Labour.]

        I did not use any uncouth adjectives like you did in my regard. But then that is your style with those who do not agree with you. And then you have the cheek to call others “hamalli”.

        [Daphne – When I call others hamalli, it’s a statement of fact. I do not use the word in your regard, but certainly for some of the people commenting here. Unfortunately, people in Malta tend to think that smart people don’t use bad words. They do: just differently.]

        I merely answered your biased opinion.

        [Daphne – Oh, MY biased opinion. I see. Ghax inti unbiased hafna. Your admiration for Mintoff is dispassionate (a contradiction in terms).]

        Apparently I irked you too. I wonder why? I am a firm believer in freedom of speech and although a private citizen, I am entitled to my own opinion. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. As to your last vicious sentence, I leave my students to judge me on that. I have complete trust in them and they are not exactly the gullible lot you seem to think they are.

        [Daphne – As a lecturer at a catering college, you should know that it’s SAUCE, not GOOD: what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Vicious? This, coming fromn an admirer of Mintoff? U hallini, tridx. As for your students, what exactly do you expect them to do – object, when not even mature adults have the guts to do so? You’re pissed off because I’m probably the first one who’s told you to your face, so to speak, that your behaviour is completely inappropriate. X’jonqos taghmel issa, isaqsi xi studenta ghal date u tghid it’s your right because it’s a free country? Marelli, x’nies.]

      • Jozef says:

        Henry Mifsud could explain why Mintoff’s orders to intercept Libyan gunboats, during the Saipem incident, were refused by the Libyan personnel manning our patrol boats, remaining in port.

        He could explain how come Italy’s Gladio carried a full dossier regarding Malta’s military subservience to Gaddafi, defining it as a ‘base Libica’, leading senators to push for a defence agreement with Malta at the earliest.

        Finally, he could explain why Magistrates are still pursuing the ‘pista Maltese’ regarding the horrific bombing in Bologna, whether the thesis that explosives on their way to the PLO,accidentally set off, could have been dispatched from Libya via Malta, is true.

        Or whether an even worse scenario could have been likely, retribution for Italy’s signing of the first protocol a few hours earlier.

        Mintoff with his bluff led us into Malta’s worst nightmare, electing Gaddafi hakem by mistake. What has to be seen is to what extent the Labour Party was financed to execute the colonel’s designs in the Meditterranean.

        And who the new owners are.

      • Henry Mifsud says:

        Hahaha Daphne get a life ….. or better still …. seek professional help.
        You are so blinkered with hatred that you have lost your sense of humour completely. I’ll start looking around for it starting by asking some of our mutual friends. They might have a clue as from where to start. not an easy task. If I manage to find it for you, it would be an excellent opportunity for us to be introduced. Perhaps then you would feel more comfortable and you won’t feel obliged to use the formal term to address me. Bye for now.
        Who knows maybe I’ll talk to you at length shortly?

        [Daphne – Be careful, Mr Mifsud, you sound as disturbed as the 18-year-old cretinous members of the Mintoffian underclass who post on Facebook and occasionally, this website. For somebody your sort of age, and a lecturer to boot, it is not a good idea or even a good look. And your last sentence gives away what most of you people really want, which is my attention and some form of engagement with me. ]

      • Henry Mifsud says:

        Ostentatious, aren’t you?

        [Daphne – Not at all. People like me leave that to the nouveaux riches.]

        But then who said that we should limit the number of different shades of gray? You seem to be an expert at it by even daring to threaten, eh, advising me to be careful at my age.

        Thanks for your concern …… and rest assured that there was no intended engagement of any sort on my part. Promise.

        I’ll stop here as otherwise if you keep on answering me, one might be led to believe that I truly managed to grab your attention, which of course I didn’t.

  30. H.P. Baxxter says:

    Now THIS is a giant.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-19381098

    Rest in peace, Neil.

    • TinaB says:

      Imbasta ghandhom il-fejssbukk.

      Ja qabda criecer.

    • maryanne says:

      He’s friends with Nikita Alamango, so no surprise.

      What baffles me is that his family is Nationalist and he lives in USA. So from where did he get his facts? He bartered the direct experience of his dear parents. No need to say more.

    • Jozef says:

      He describes the drydocks as a succesful self-sufficient enterprise.

      There’s lies, damned lies, and then there’s Labour.

      Enough said.

  31. Martin says:

    on a different note – the sheer insolence!

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120825/opinion/Recall-Mintoffianomics.434249

    but of course it’s getting many ‘likes’ on fb because that’s how Mintoffians prefer to live – tons of money in their coffers yet always whingeing about being poor. They will willingly spend hundreds on luxury items but will not spend 1 cent on health or education!

    • The chemist says:

      Mintoff spent a lot on education especially to teach us Arabic, one of the strings attached by Gaddafi seeing Dom desperate for liquid cash.

  32. C Falzon says:

    Wenzu Mintoff is explaining to us how Dom Mintoff was compromised:

    “Also, according to his nephew, Mintoff was not disposed to tolerate corruption but his position was compromised because of past loyalties of people to whom he owed so much in terms of loyalty.”

    http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/en/newsdetails/news/national/Dom-Mintoff-must-be-seen-within-the-context-of-his-time-20120825

    • La Redoute says:

      Wenzu Mintoff thinks tolerating corruption out of loyalty is an admirable principle? No surprises there.

  33. Dejjaqtuni says:

    Possibbli dawk li ghajjruh traditur u halfu li ma jridux jafu bih anzi sahansistra kissru l-inkwadri tieghu kienu hemm fil-folla?

    Rajna lil min kien qal li ma jridx jaf bih izjed anzi jekk jarah itih daqqa ta’ ponn. Dawn issa reggha bdielhom u qed jibku.

  34. Frankie's Barrage says:

    The press in Malta has never functioned as it should. No journalist has ever had the courage to tell the full story, either because of the very Maltese need for self-preservation (“ma tafx min tigi bzonn hux”) or else because the story would simply not get published.

    It is thanks to you, Daphne, and the free access to information that the web has provided that we get to hear of stories such as this.

    In the days before the net many such stories went around by word of mouth but there was no way of knowing how much truth there was in them.

    I recall four in particular that related to Mintoff and it would be great if anyone can bring out any more information about them now.

    One was that he had spent some time on a luxury yacht with the actress Raquel Welch.

    [Daphne – No, it wasn’t Raquel Welch. That’s a contraction of a couple of stories. When Charlotte Rampling was filming here in Malta back in the 1970s, Mintoff made a play for her. The yacht in question wasn’t really luxurious, at least the way we understand it by today’s standards. It was Marsovin’s ‘Noneta’, and Mintoff was a regular guest aboard back then. The Italian press occasionally published paparazzi photographs of the guests aboard when Mintoff was with them. There was one occasion when one of the Italian magazines carried pictures of Mintoff aboard a yacht, I don’t know which one or whose, among guests who included topless women, a big deal in those days. The magazine was prevented from entering Malta. I know who one of the women was, but she’s a private citizen and a respectable granny now, so we’ll let it rest.]

    Another was that Israeli special forces had once raided his home (not clear for what reason).

    Another one was that a young Maltese journalist had to leave Malta for the UK because he had come across some very compromising (for Mintoff) information about the deals made to purchase oil and the commissions that were paid. He has since returned but the story never came out if it ever existed at all.

    The most recent story was that of a Maltese marine biologist who met Mintoff to pitch to him the idea of setting up fish farms in Malta, a very innovative idea for the time. For the meeting he had even taken a farm-bred fish for Mintoff to sample. He was barely allowed to start making his case when Mintoff unceremoniously kicked him out saying that he had no time for hairbrained ideas.

  35. Observer says:

    The question is when did Sant get hold of these photos? Could it have been after 1987? Daphne, if you are right then this incident must not serve as a means to justify Mintoff’s powerless stance vis a vis Sant’s ruthless methods.

    • curious says:

      How he got hold of them is another story, but that day they were presented in parliament, everyone who was there and their staff saw them,

  36. sean says:

    ma jmissekx tisthi tajd dawk laffarijiet kollha dwar bniedem mejjet

    [Daphne – Le, lanqas xejn. Daqs kemm staha hu jaghmilhom meta kien haj.]

  37. pals says:

    Why have you waited till Mintoff died to say this? I don’t think it was because you respected him!

    Wenzu Mintoff if you are reading this blog … have you anything to say?

    [Daphne – Well, it’s quite obvious that you are not a regular reader of this website and only popped in here because your Facebook friends egged you on to ‘ara xqalet s sahara’. I’ve repeated this information on several occasions. And now, of course, it’s even more topical. What does Wenzu Mintoff have to say? Nothing. Because it’s true. Or rather, a volley of obscenities, probably, in his fashion. And then we can wait for a volley of abuse on the newspaper he edits, the Labour Party’s. You people are so naive. What, did you actually think your Mintoff was some of virgin?]

    • Anthony says:

      Pals ,you must be the one Neil Armstrong left behind in July 1969.

      Unusually hot summer in London that year. It was lovely being able to swim in the Serpentine of all places.

      Welcome back to planet earth.

    • Grezz says:

      So Saviour Balzan has known about this story all along, yet never writes about it because Wenzu Mintoff is his friend.

      Charming. Really independent.

      And then he had the nerve to persecute the police commissioner for an affair he had with some Polish slag.

      • Qeghdin Sew says:

        There are many ‘independent’ journalists, editors, columnists or even bloggers who stick up for their closest friends.

        [Daphne – Saviour Balzan owns a newspaper. He is not ‘a journalist’. This means he controls the entire newspaper. I control only my column. The rest of the newspaper is free to attack my closest friends. Why, it even allows people to attack me at times.]

  38. Thea says:

    Fid-dinja hadd mhu perfett ta ghidulha l’ din. u fuq kollox il-hajja privata tieghu missha hargitha meta kien haj halli jirrispondiha mhux wara mewtu.

    [Daphne – “Ghidulha il-din”. Jaqq, kemm intom hamalli. Iva, fil-fatt ktibt daara meta kien haj din l-istorja, diversi drabi, u jekk ma indunajtx, hadd ma qal xejn ghax il-verita.]

  39. Manuel says:

    The Sunday Times of Malta published today a photo of prince Harry in the nude at a party in Las Vegas. Prince Harry, being heir to the British throne, is an important public figure and his actions are offensive to his person and to the office which he holds.

    It is right for newspapers to condemn such acts by public figures, even when such acts take place in private.

    However, in the same issue of The Times one only find eulogies for the dead dictator of Malta. No mention of his atrocities, defamations, adultry, control over everything and everyone even if some of these actions were held in private.

    The Times does not object to print a phot of prince Harry in the nude but it seems it wants to remain aloof from condemning the terrible years of the Mintoffian regime. It boasts that it is carrying an exclusive reportage of the funeral.

    Journalists at The Times should read more often British newspapers and this blog. Maybe they will learn how they should report critically and analytically important events.

    • Pecksniff says:

      Labour always wanted an English language newspaper but it never got off the ground. Now The Times and Malta Today have stepped in to oblige them.

    • David says:

      I was always struck by the Gospel saying that the truth makes us free. Unfortunately most of what is said or written does not accurately or competely reflect the truth.

      Your comment on the Times and Sunday Times of Malta is grossly unfair. Today’s well written editorial explains the views of Dr Fenech Adami and of the the Times, which are similar. The Times did not take a prejudiced view but this does not mean taking an uncritical view of Mintoff.

      In fact Mr Lino Spiteri’s article in today’s Sunday Times, as one expects from a former leading Labour politician, praises Mintoff for whay he perceives as his achievements. However he also criticizes him for what he considers to be his faults.

      As regards Price Harry, who is not dead yet, the British press, except The Sun, did not publish the nude photos, despite the fact that they were easily accesible on the Internet. The press of other countries on the other hand published these photos.

      I reiterate my initial reference to the time-honoured phrase.

  40. CM says:

    Sinjura,

    “The proof of one’s maturity was when one needed to make a choice between being controversial and showing dignity in times such as this and the government had rightly chosen the latter.”

    Dr Gonzi as quoted on TOM online

    [Daphne – I agree with him. I said at the outset that the government had no choice but to give Mintoff a state funeral, because Mintoff’s government had given George Borg Olivier a state funeral. My disagreement was with Eddie Fenech Adami’s words, and he is not part of the government. Nor am I, which is why I don’t have the same diplomatic constraints that the government has. I have no role in this death or funeral, so dignity does not figure. The same can’t be said of those who did have a role – his family, friends and the Labour Party – who made an utter hash of things and behaved with a near-total absence of dignity. For a start, his daughters should never have accepted the offer of a state funeral and stuck to a private burial. All that gawking at their father’s corpse would have been unbearable to him, and they must have known it.]

  41. Xejn Sew says:

    More than Mintoff, I find his followers are endlessly fascinating.

    Here’s some suggested reading for the blind Mintoffjani, and for anyone who wants to even begin to understand their psyche:

    The Allure of Toxic Leaders: Why We Follow Destructive Bosses and Corrupt Politicians–and How We Can Survive Them, by Jean Lipman-Blumen.
    (http://www.amazon.com/The-Allure-Toxic-Leaders-Politicians/dp/0195166345).

    “Toxic leaders, both political, like Slobodan Milosevic, and corporate, like Enron’s Ken Lay, have always been with us, and many books have been written to explain what makes them tick. Here leadership scholar Jean Lipman-Blumen explains what makes the followers tick, exploring why people will tolerate–and remain loyal to–leaders who are destructive to their organizations, their employees, or their nations.

    “Why do we knowingly follow, seldom unseat, frequently prefer, and sometimes even create toxic leaders? Lipman-Blumen argues that these leaders appeal to our deepest needs, playing on our anxieties and fears, on our yearnings for security, high self-esteem, and significance, and on our desire for noble enterprises and immortality. She also explores how followers inadvertently keep themselves in line by a set of insidious control myths that they internalize. For example, the belief that the leader must necessarily be in a position to “know more” than the followers often stills their objections. In addition, outside forces–such as economic depressions, political upheavals, or a crisis in a company–can increase our anxiety and our longing for charismatic leaders.”

    Dom’s death, and especially the reactions of his followers, prompted me to reread this book which I had bought with Dom in mind. It is so bang on.

    You can also have a look at these:

    – short abstract of the book http://www.economist.com/media/globalexecutive/allure_of_toxic_leaders.pdf

    – paper by the author http://connectiveleadership.com/articles/why_followers_rarely_escape_their_clutches.pdf

  42. Injorant says:

    What if someone like say, Guido de Marco acted on the same lines! Would you comment on those episodes? Just hypothetically asking.

    [Daphne – If you were a regular reader, you would know that question to be redundant.]

  43. Giovanni says:

    Do like me and just don’t buy The Times. I used to buy it for a number of years but not any more.

  44. Jozef says:

    Fr.Lucie Smith hit the nail on the head when he blamed Mintoff for the uglification of Malta as a place. Maybe the above could provide some details to what extent it could have been avoided.

    Hopefully someday, we may realise that the perversity of using individual greed to plan is a dead end. But that would require a muted sense of order.

    I think Mintoff was submitted to a religious ceremony simply because there was no public place of his making which could have served genius loci. I take this to be his utmost failure.

    His people, miserable out of spite, helpless in spirit, slaves to his manners and idiom are a living testimony to his callousness. They say imitation is the best form of praise, so be it, as long as he’s dead.

    I just have one thing to say to these people, whenever I need work done, their obtuse indolence and misplaced pride renders them something to avoid.

    Joseph Muscat has just put himself in a quandary, they will expect what Mintoff did, will he do the same?

  45. john says:

    ‘Penniless in Malta’. The title of Moyra Mintoff’s biography.

  46. gaetano parnis says:

    daphne when you die we will make a monument . of you and your family, on the maghtab, we curse yours family cause they are , the same as you . devil’s diseples . gaetano parnis

    [Daphne – Trid tkun Laburist tar-rahal biex tghajjar bir-razza u r-radika. Progressivi liberali ta’ zmien il-medjoevo. Kemm nithassarkom. Daqstant opportunitajiet u xorta l-istess bqajtu ghaliex ma tistghux tfiequ mil-kundizzjoni gravi li ghandkhom: IQ baxx immens. M’hemmx taghmel. Dik kwistjoni ta’ genetika.]

  47. jessi fabri says:

    daphne when you we’re born the midwife threw the baby away and keep the placenta that’s why you are ugly . when you die even the devil won’t accept you cursw on the newspaper you write on, don’t buy it please labourites .jessi fabri

    [Daphne – Why bother buying it when you quite clearly are incapable of reading it?]

  48. Mesmes says:

    Out of interest – was Wenzu Mintoff’s father at the funeral?

  49. Loredana Gatt says:

    Your article in The Malta Independent on Sunday is brilliant. The part about women’s vote, truly outstanding.

  50. Interested Bystander says:

    Were the photos taken by Mintoff?

    Or by a hidden third person?

    Or a third person taking part in ‘Ugandan discussions’?

    Did Mintoff have equipment to develop photos?

    If not, how would they have been developed?

    More questions than answers.

  51. pals says:

    Yes I started reading your blogs quite recently , and I look forward to read them as a matter of fact , but I m a person that needs proof not only words , maybe you should have recorded what he had to say when he came to you !! but to the contrary you mentioned credible people like Mr. Balzan so there might be truth in what you are saying too .

  52. MaX says:

    “Xerrdu l-velenu taghkom kollu fuqi. Isa, ahlu fuqi l-inka u il-karti kollha li ghandkom. Dan lili, jaghtini aktar sahha”
    DM The Malta Chronicle 05/01/1939

  53. Mar says:

    How sad that we as a nation seem capable to only play the same old songs to each other, rather than focus on the discussion of the topic at hand.

    Why aren’t we sticking to discussing the factuality (or otherwise) of these incidents and their relevance (if any) to our country? and hence whether or not such matters are to be treated as private family matters?

  54. Paul Bonnici says:

    Daphne, ghandek santa ta’ Mintoff hdejn is-sodda? Issa monument gej, quddiemek imissom itellawh.

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120826/local/mintoff.434466

    • Paul Bonnici says:

      I wonder who will pay for it. The Mintoff family are loaded now, they should pay for it. Maybe another bill for the tax payer after the state funeral.

  55. elephant says:

    By his absence, Alfred Sant has shown that he has character.

  56. Robin says:

    Mela, qisu Robin Hood kien, jiehu minghand is-sinjur biex jaghti l-fqir.

    Min jaf il-but tieghu u ta’madwaru kif kien mimli eeee. Dak ma jghidulkomx tal-Labour.

  57. grima says:

    Yes I totally agree with you, Daphne, that the press in Malta is still inadequate on sensitive issues.

    The story you carried out was not just about an affair between a man and a woman, but it clearly had repercussions on our country.

  58. Gahan says:

    Lino Spiteri wrote that Mintoff’s father was a fisherman.

    Wenzu Mintoff Senior was a British Navy cook and Mintoff’s mother was not a money-lender but a usurer.

    When Mintoff was studying at the seminary, he wasn’t paying any fees because his family claimed they were poor, but when the Church authorities came to know of the amount of money thrown for his sister’s marriage, they asked the family to cough up the school fees, Mintoff preferred to leave the seminary instead of paying, and the Church lost a vocation and created an unforgiving enemy.

  59. kev says:

    Serious investigative journalism entails fully substantiated allegations. Anything else is tabloid drivel.

    [Daphne – I believe Wenzu Mintoff is an associate of yours, of sorts. Why don’t you go ahead and ring him. I only know all this because he’s the one who told me: the most reliable source of all, as it happens, after his mother and Mintoff himnself.]

    In this case, the drivel oozes from an intellectual pygmy whose only objective in life seems to be to mock a nation she feels no part of.

    This is the same pigmy that calls the findings of global investigative journalists ‘conspiracy theories’, while wallowing in parochial blissful ignorance with large chips on both shoulders and a tongue in each cheek.

    • Anthony says:

      Another guy in total denial.

      The facts are written on the wall. They have been common knowledge for years.

      The truth is too hard to countenance.

      The Salvator Mundi screwing his dear brother’s wife.

      There is no mention of this in the Sermon on the Mount.

      No ninth beatitude.

      So it’s pygmies, drivel, pigmies, chips, tongues, cheeks, anything.

      Photographs do not suffice. They did from Lorry Sant’s point of view. And how.

      Ask Wenzu.

    • kev says:

      Was Wenzu’s outpour as confidential as Salvu’s, or did you use different potions for disparate emotions?

      It would at least explain why they both look spellbound.

      [Daphne – The noun is ‘outpouring’, and the verb would be ‘pour (out)’. ‘Outpour’ does not exist. You are confusing it with ‘downpour’, which refers to heavy rainfall.]

  60. C.A says:

    Jekk dan li qed tghid hu verita, u kont taf bih fl-1991 ghax ma ppublikajtux dak iz-zmien, jew bzajt u stennejt li iz-zewgt persuni li implikajt imutu. jekk hu hekk int ghamilt bhal kumplament tal-media u hbejt informazzjoni. Sewwa jghidu il-qahba milli jkolla ttik.

    [Daphne – Ghaliex l-internet ma kienx jezisti u allura ma kellix blog, injorant inkwadrat.]

    • C.A. says:

      L-internet ilu aktar min 20 sena u l-gurnali ilhom aktar, stajt ktibt dak li ktibt issa zien ilu ja brava, ghax ghalik kullhadd injurant anke l-arcisqof u l-Piministru u min baghat kliem ta tifhir kem min Malta u min barra, dawn kolla injuranti int biss il brava

      [Daphne – Isma sew, CA: l-internet dahal Malta hafa wara l-1992 u anke wara li dahal, in-nies kienu juzawh biss ghal email u websites basiki qishom brochures. Ma kienx hemm ‘online newspapers’ Maltin u anke barra minn Malta, il-kuncett ta’ blog ma kienx jezisti. Gurnalist ma jistax jikteb xil-madoffi irid f’gazzetta. Hemm editur. Foris ghalhekk Wenzu Mintoff u Saviour Balzan ma kitbuhiex din l-istorja. Issa Saviour Balzan jista’ facilment jiktibu hu, ghaliex ghandu gazzetta tieghu, imma le, dak biss fl-Evil Click jiffissa.]

  61. GABS says:

    It’s pretty obvious. The Times of Malta are scared shitless of being attacked by the marmalja.

    • The chemist says:

      Seeing that the ‘moviment’ might be in power soon has to put some fear in the directors of Allied Newspapers after all the money they spent relocating. Although i’m sure they will be insured, the premium will surely go up once Jowzef becomes the new ‘Salvatur’.

  62. Claire says:

    Unfortunately both the alleged blackmailer and his victim are now both dead, so there is no way of establishing if blackmail was involved it all.

    The only reason this story would be of public interest is if blackmail was involved at all, as Mintoff clearly did not give two hoots about any sort of morality so cuckolding his brother would not have made him a hypocrite and therefore of little public interest.

    [Daphne – Are you out of your mind? Having a sexual affair with your brother’s wife is in a class all of its own, and there are consequences and issues involved that do not have to do with morality alone. Surely even a Labour voter can work that one out. Mintoff knew his audience very, very well. And like me, he knew that if news broke that he had done that to his brother, it would have been the end of him. Cheat your brother, lie to your brother, steal from your brother, but have sex with your brother’s wife? No. That’s the big taboo, the big loss of face, the greatest impugning of honour.]

    It is one thing educating those who are not in the know about those horrible times and quite another publishing a story over which little can be now. This sort of story does nothing but cause harm to his surviving family. If I were Wenzu Mintoff I’d have doubts who my real father is and wonder if I’d just lost an uncle or a biological father.

    [Daphne – Yes, he does in fact have those doubts.]

    I’m all for freedom of speech but rights generally are given as long as they do not trespass on the freedom of others.

    I support most of your writings but on this one, I hope the surviving family looks into the possibility of legal action. I have no wish to defend Mintoff but I fail to see how allegations of adultery, bisexuality and the lot are of public interest.

    [Daphne – That would be a little difficult, wouldn’t it, given that it was Wenzu Mintoff himself who told me, in the presence of the man who brought him to my home for the express purpose of telling me.]

    Such stories only incite division and hatred amongst an already divided population. Sorry but on this one irrespective what the tabloids do in the UK, I believe you are stooping low.

    [Daphne – The day I do what Mintoff did, tell me I’ve stooped low. One does not ‘stoop low’ by reporting the low actions of former prime ministers.]

    • Claire says:

      I admire your work most of the time and I’ve never voted Labour in my life or intend to ever do. My concern here is for the surviving family member in question.

      [Daphne – I can’t see why I should concern myself about that. Wenzu Mintoff will understand, because he adopts much the same approach when he writes about me or members of my family. Not that there is anything to write about, but it doesn’t stop him making things up. You do know he’s the editor at Labour’s newspaper KullHadd, right?]

      If we could get to the bottom of things and establish if there was blackmail or not I’d agree with pursuing this story but at this point in time I very much doubt the truth will ever come out.

      I’ve only ever met Wenzu Mintoff online and can assure you he came across as a very educated person but then again we never discussed politics in our chats and if we had we’d probably have disagreed.

      [Daphne – Exactly why is Wenzu Mintoff chatting to ladies on line? If by educated you mean well-mannered and civilised, then no, he isn’t that at all. He’s an absolute prick. U inkredibbli kemm hu bniedem ahdar.]

      My concern is that it is unfair for the low actions of his relatives, to cause him such public humiliation, shame and anguish. Even if the reported facts were true we do not pick and choose our family.

      I don’t know a thing about Wenzu Mintoff’s public life but my sense of compassion tells me that this story would cause anyone a lot of pain.

      [Daphne – Claire, believe me: you are wasting your time feeling compassion for somebody who edits one of the scummiest newspapers around. It is not as though he has any compassion for his victims. And we’re not talking factual coverage like this, either. I’d be careful who I meet on line if I were you. That’s how people end up raped, murdered, abducted or married to conmen. Of course, I don’t mean Wenzu.]

      As a rule I’m not remotely interested in the private life of politicians, I don’t read glossies or gossip columns. What scares me about public life is in fact the scutiny at times warranted, at times not. I believes it takes the skin of a rhino to subject oneself to the kind of media scutiny we have in today’s world.

      Maybe, I’m so used to expecting the worst of Mintoff that unlike his audience at the time, I am not shocked that he would do that to his brother seeing he did so much worse to the country and its citizens. Unlike Mintoff’s audience at the time I am an atheist so there are no religious implications there for me.

      Somehow I do not find the act itself shocking, it is not something I would ever do myself but as a product of my generation I do not find sexual peccadillos shocking in the least and almost expect the worst of politicians.

      [Daphne – I sometimes wonder what other people’s families must be like when I hear something like this. You just don’t get it, do you? THIS IS NOT ABOUT SEX. THIS IS ABOUT THE DEEPEST, MOST GROSS, FORM OF BETRAYAL. IT IS NOT ABOUT HAVING SEX WITH A WOMAN WHO IS NOT YOUR WIFE. IT IS ABOUT BETRAYING, AT THE MOST PROFOUND LEVEL, YOUR OWN BROTHER. If you don’t find that shocking, we can part company right here.]

      Seeing most of them are so power-hungry I tend to have a low opinion of most of them, with some notable exceptions like EFA and although I disagree completely with his politics, Alfred Sant. They both strike me as men of integrity although you probably think there is no comparison.

      All I’m saying here is we all know we would probably run out of expletives to describe Mintoff but let’s not lose our compassion for the suffering of his surviving family members. I’m sure they can live with the criticism of Mintoff’s public life but in Wenzu Mintoff’s shoes I’d disown my mother right now and book the first therapy appointment available.

      • maryanne says:

        Claire, you admitted that you don’t know anything about Wenzu Mintoff’s public life. That means you are very young or you lived abroad.

        You have a poor opinion of all MPs, and hold Fenech Adami and Sant as equals.

        You do not regard having sex with your brother’s wife as shocking, but you do object to Daphne writing about it. That’s nice. If it’s not so shocking let her write about it.

        I think the above disqualifies you from talking objectively and I don’t ever wish to be a friend, (not in the real word and neither online) with somebody who reasons the way you.

      • Claire says:

        Actually I know little about Wenzu Mintoff’s public life or the newspaper he runs which I don’t read and didn’t know he was the editor of.

        [Daphne – My, no wonder people get into such messes.]

        We chatted a few times as do most people nowadays to kill time, about things like health, fitness and work and he came across as pleasant and well-mannered.

        As to meeting men on the internet, I met my best male friend of two years online and he is the most considerate person I have ever met. There’s no danger if you stick to public places keep your wits about you and take your time assessing a person.

        [Daphne – You’re not keeping your wits about you, Claire, if you’re chatting to Labour politicians without knowing they are Labour politicians and that they edit the Labour Party’s newspaper. U tajba din ukoll. Wenzu Mintoff trying to pick up women in chat forums at his age. Or maybe because of his age? Tridx nidhollu jien taht false alias u nittantah wahda sewwa kif naf jien. Bloody idiot.]

        It’s just another facet of modern socializing. You have to be as selective as you would be at a bar and it’s not always anonymous, at times it’s through mutual friends on Facebook.

        As to the comparison between EFA and Alfred Sant, it’s purely in terms of what strikes me as integrity. You are free to disagree with me but he was right about JPO and he refused a chauffeur-driven car. Just because he was a Labour PM and I disagree with his policies, does not mean he must be corrput or evil.

        I understand that sleeping with your brother’s wife is the ultimate form of betrayal but this is the era of trash TV and the Jerry Springer Show and we’ve become desentisized to the shock value of such things.

        In the UK my jaw dropped when I watched a show called Sex Inspectors where they actually film couples having sex and then dissect their performance. I thought you could not go lower than that. I’m afraid nothing about the human race shocks me any more.

        In Iran they’re discussing allowing marriage to girls under 10. I read the Princess trilogy at one go about the conditions of women in Saudi. I’ve reached the stage where I just accept mankind for what it is and it’s not a positive image.

        For the record, my mother is typically religious and she would be appalled to read about this sort of betrayal and she did teach me right from wrong but as to being shocked no I’m sorry I’m immune to it all.

  63. RonPaul2012 says:

    Thumbs up Daphne. This is journalism.

    But as Julian Assange said when he launched Wikileaks, mainstream media today is only there to serve the ruling elite and not to reveal the truth.

    There’s an even bigger story than this that might really expose Mintoff for what he really is – it’s 1998, and the real reason he voted against his own party, bringing down the government.

    • kev says:

      You forget that in 1998 Mintoff kept insisting that he was voting solely on the Cottonera project.

      It was Sant himself who tried to play chess with the old master by tying the bill to a vote of confidence. It was another one of those huge errors for which Sant will long be remembered.

  64. C Mangion says:

    You are one frustated wiked bitch go to marsa open center and get laid by all the blackman u can find and after give them a blow job then u can die peasefully

  65. Matthew says:

    The photos in question were sealed by Dr. Lawrence Gonzi but were later stolen from the Speaker’s chamber some time between 1996 – 1998, when Miriam Spiteri Debono was speaker.

  66. Jozef says:

    Now this is going to be interesting, I just hope they launch a competition, very democratic.

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120826/local/mintoff.434466

    If, according to her, he was ‘sent by Jesus Christ’ (yes, she did say it during the prayers of the faithful), she shouldn’t have a problem with us lot having a go.

  67. Labour's plan says:

    Oh, at last. Labour’s first plan revealed.

    http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120826/local/mintoff.434466

  68. Brian says:

    The hypocrisy of Eddie Fenech Adami’s tribute to Dom Mintoff is astonishing. Fenech Adami damned (and rightly so) Mintoff for his dictatorial reign during the 70s and 80s on this sorry excuse of a rock.

    It is no more disturbing than yesterday’s euology by the Archbishop, highly praising Mintoff throughout the latter’s political years Add the 75% of the Labour politicians and supporters, where just a few years back, they branded Mintoff TRADITUR tal MALTIN…

    My response to the above = Facciolizmu tipiku tal-gens taghna.

    “Of mankind we may say in general they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain” – Niccolo Machiavelli

  69. Claire says:

    correction: you trespass onto private property and encroach on someone else’s rights

  70. fair and true says:

    Dear daphne,
    What you have said above may well be true, and just like yourself I have lived through the eighties, the church and the private schools closing, etc etc…and suffered those too…..but you cannot not also mention the abundance of good that Mintoff did for the non wealthy, non privilaged masses….maybe true sometimes at the detriment of the upper classes….true too…but it was he that did his best to make education available for all, the provision of the welfare state, the setting up of Airmalta…”unfairly called ghasafar tac comb’, seamalta, etc, etc…i am sure you are a well read person…and well versed i hope in Maltese 20c history, as well as the history of political parties. Great people…like all of us including yourself are human…and have their personal problems too…but that does not reduce the greatness of a person that has been synonomous with maltese development from the post war era……you cannot judge Mintoff by the last 5 years of Labour government and neither the labour’s achievements…..

    [Daphne – I do not judge Mintoff by the last five years of his government. Whatever gave you that impression? And it is precisely because I am well informed that my judgement and my views are what they are.]

    • Antoine Vella says:

      What Mintoff did was not just “to the detriment of the upper classes” but had a negative impact on all of society.

      Human and civil rights, which were trampled with a vengeance throughout the long years of the regime, do not belong only to what you call “the upper classes”.

      • La Redoute says:

        Thanks for saying that. I take it so much for granted I forget that so many don’t. All those eulogising Mintoff and saying he did so much good, created jobs, eliminated poverty, etc. etc etc. ignore the way he rode roughshod over everyone.

        So some got themselves a plot of land u erba telef lira biex jibnuh. So what? They’d have been far better off being given the chance to do things for themselves, and Malta as a whole would have been better off too.

  71. Kitaa says:

    you fucking bitch . you hate mintoff you hate the teachings if christ

    [Daphne – Mintoff is Christ?]

    • NotSuperOne says:

      Mela, mela, u Joe Grima, Karmenu Vella. AST, u JAM huma id-dixxipli tieghu.

      Psssssst smajtu jekk il- Perit qamx jew le , ghax it-tlitt ijiem ghaddew diga.

  72. Qeghdin Sew says:

    I am the first one to think that the way you reacted to his death in general, although entirely predictable for anyone who’s been following this blog long enough, was rather crass and insensitive at times. However, this story needs to be published because, as you say, it does explain a lot.

  73. Jason Tanti says:

    Mintoff 70/80’s legacy was the deep political strife between us Maltese, (‘Jew maghna, jew kontra taghna’ was his battle cry) and that only jobs available were with the government.

    Surely in those days it didn’t feel like salvation at all.

  74. Oliver says:

    Peter Beauclerk-Dewar writes (The Times of London):

    While at Hertford College, Oxford, as a Rhodes Scholar, Dom Mintoff (obituary, Aug 22) took lodgings with Florence Bentinck, an aristocratic widow. Her husband’s family of Bentinck was headed by the Duke of Portland. Despite his leftwing inclinations Dom made a bee line for each of her three daughters. Gwynella and Primrose rejected him and ultimately Moyra who agreed to marry him in 1947. It was a difficult marriage and at one stage Ted Heath, as Prime Minister, found himself acting as a mediator, during the difficult negotiations between the UK and Malta in 1972. In 1978 Yana, their younger daughter, hit the headlines when she threw down three bags of horse manure and straw from the Visitors’ Gallery in the House of Commons, breaching security arrangements. Dom seems to have spent much of his turbulent life fighting the Opposition, the British Government, the Royal Navy and the Catholic Church, yet he is now to have a magnificent send off with a State Funeral on Saturday.

    • H.P. Baxxter says:

      “…yet he is now to have a magnificent send off.”

      Oh magnificent British subtlety! And our government cannot see how it has made itself a laughing stock in the UK.

  75. Oliver says:

    Lord Lexden writes:

    “Despite the rude manner in which Dom Mintoff demanded vastly increased rent for Malta’s naval base, Ted Heath invited him to Chequers in September 1971.

    He arrived at 24 hours’ notice. Heath was emollience itself, assuring his irascible visitor that, as he noted later in his memoirs, he would do “everything possible to find a mutually agreeable conclusion”.

    Conviviality restored, Heath escorted Mintoff to the house’s White Parlour. There the astonished Labour Prime Minister found his aristocratic English wife (a relative of the Duke of Portland) from whom he was estranged. A touching, though only temporary reconciliation took place.

    Heath afterwards sought to boast of his skills as a marriage counsellor. Lord Carrington, however, firmly contradicted him with a very different version of events.

    He recalled receiving a telephone call from a highly agitated Heath who said that Mrs Mintoff had turned up unexpectedly, her husband having asked her “to meet him here. Here! To talk things over, over tea, with me!” It is far from certain that Mintoff’s visit to Chequers was quite the success that Heath claimed.”

    Knowing what a miserable skunk he was I am sure Lord Carrington’s version is closer to the truth. What an utter disgrace he was.

  76. P Shaw says:

    When will The Malta Independent stand up and take advantage of this opportunity to fill the vacuum in Maltese journalism, even if it transforms itself into an electronic newspaper like the Huffington Post or the Daily Beast.?

    I am not an expert in this filed, but I suspect that the newspapers in Malta lack adequate human resources and talent.

  77. Anthony says:

    He arranged to have tea with his wife but made sure Ted Heath paid for it.

  78. pals says:

    There was no Internet but surely a woman like you would have found ways and means to tell all at that time

    [Daphne – Really, like what? Standing on a street corner and shouting it out? Distributing pamphlets, like in former centuries? Like I always say, tghixu f’dinja ghalikom.]

    , now they don’t give a fuck what you are writing they are dead !! , They cannot respond to your accusations , it would have been much better you confronting them … don’t you think ? …

    [Daphne – I wrote the same thing when Mintoff was alive. You’re new to this blog, so you wouldn’t know that. Wenzu Mintoff is still alive. But he can’t say it’s not true. Nor can Mintoff’s daughters.]

  79. Alfred Zammit says:

    Min ma ghandux dnub jitfa l-ewwel gebla. I am sure this is not the case here.

  80. John Zammit says:

    Insew il-Lejburisti kemm kienu jitkazaw b’ din it-tip ta’ hajja dak ma’ dik u dak ma’ l ohra. Issa li rajna l-istampa cara kif kienet il-Lejburisti donnhom iridu isibu skuza kif din il-grajja jiskuzawha halli hu jidher uman.

    Kemm qed nisma b’ Mintoff li kien jimxi fuq il-hajja ta’ Kristu! Vera ma nifilhux naqaw fil-bassezzi.

    Povru Dr Gorg Borg Olivier meta il-mara tieghu kella il-kaz taghha, il-Lejburisti bla ebda kuxjenza kienu jaghjruh bla ma kellu ebda htija “barri”. Issa l-idolu tal-Lejburisti mhux talli ma kienx barri hu imma kien ibarri lill hadd iehor u il-vili mhux xi hadd barra mil-familja tieghu imma lill huh stess – biex naraw il-vizjoni vera ta’ Kristu!

    jien inhossni vera disgustat bil-gideb sfaccat kif il-Lejburisti iridu jmexxu meta haga semplici jibdluwha f’ virtuwijiet spettakolari. Mintoff miet u nispera li din is-saga tieqaf u nipprovaw ninsew mhux ghax mhux tajjeb li wiehed jitghallem minnhom imma inhossni nisthi nuri li dan kien imexxi lill Malta.

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