One reason why new judge Wenzu Mintoff is so full of hate and bitterness, and why he was happy to return to the Labour Party after Lorry Sant died
Lorry Sant glued as always to Mintoff’s hip
Wenzu Mintoff
In late 1991 or thereabouts, some of us got to know the real source of Lorry Sant’s power and influence over Labour leader and premier Dom Mintoff, but because the nature of the press was different in those days, we were not allowed to report it, even though it was right there in the public domain, in parliament.
Lorry Sant was the quintessential Maltese robber baron of the 1970s and 1980s. He was a government minister who did pretty much as he pleased, redefining abuse, corruption and violence.
His henchmen pillaged and plundered, threatened each other with revolvers over land deals, hid his millions and fronted his developments, and one accountant ended up cut into small pieces dumped in a well.
Yes, really.
EU Commissioner-designate Il-Guy Karmenu Vella calls that time ‘the golden years of Labour’ – because he was part of it and one of Lorry Sant’s fellow ministers.
Lorry Sant was the only man who intimidated Mintoff and bullied him, rather than the other way round. We always wondered why.
Then, that night in parliament in 1991, il-Lorry took the source of his power to parliament in a brown envelope, and we saw that it was blackmail. He had been blackmailing Dom Mintoff for years. Only this time he didn’t want to use the contents of his brown envelope against the former premier, who was now just an ordinary backbencher while Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici was leader.
This time, he wanted to use those photographs to get at Wenzu Mintoff, because Wenzu Mintoff had resigned the Labour whip but kept his seat and called himself ‘AD’ (it didn’t last long).
Lorry Sant put the envelope on the table of the House. The Speaker looked at the photographs and ordered that the envelope be sealed and locked up. But Wenzu Mintoff had to be informed of the contents and when he looked at them, expecting to see compromising photographs of himself with some girl or other, he instead got the tremendous shock of seeing photographs of his naked mother, taken at what was clearly L-Gharix, Dom Mintoff’s lair in Delimara.
This would have been bad enough, but what made it worse than seeing pictures of his naked mother in some other man’s house was the fact that this other man was his father’s brother. So he also had to deal with the fact that his father had been cuckolded by his own brother, his Uncle Dom.
In an instant he understood why his mother always disappeared from the family home on Wednesdays. Wednesday was the day, famously, when Mintoff didn’t go in to the office. He also had to cope with the awful possibility that his biological father might actually be his uncle.
You wouldn’t wish this situation on anyone, not even somebody as horrid as Wenzu Mintoff. This sort of information is enough of a killer when you receive it in private. Imagine receiving it in the public forum of parliament, before the rest of the House, from a yelling Lorry Sant. It shows what sort of person Sant was.
And yes, these are all indisputable facts.
Since that time, Wenzu Mintoff has become progressively nastier and chip-ridden, wanting his vengeance on the world. After Lorry Sant died of cancer in 1995, he made his way back to the Labour Party and proceeded to become even more of a bitter and vengeful Mintoffjan ahdar than even his uncle was, taking it out on everyone and everything he perceived (usually correctly) as being anti-Mintoff and anti-Labour.
There were moments when you really just wanted to tell him that he was taking it out on the wrong people. But in the end, I suppose, the real reason is that blood will out.
Making him a judge has been this government’s greatest single act of gross irresponsibility so far – as though there haven’t been enough problematic judges and magistrates already, with a couple of them incumbent still, one of them currently undergoing proceedings before the Commission for the Administration of Justice and another one of them about to evade impeachment.
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Simon Busuttil used the battle cry of “Gas down ghal gol-hajt” but it seems it is turning out to be more like racing down the gutter. Gas down ghal qiegh il-fossa.
Surely Mallia must have thought that Wenzu is under qualified to become a Magistrate but fully qualified to sit as a Judge.
The ex editor and pensioner Frans Ghirxi of the rubbish daily L-Orizzont has been recycled into a senior executive at ETC and now the editor of the even worse rubbish weekly paper il-KullHadd is appointed a Judge. God help me ever facing him.
It must be a clear example of government meritocracy in action, which I don’t happen to see but I do see a fast trend of lowering of standards across the board Chinese style. At this rate, I will not be surprised to read one day that Joseph Muscat proposed Tony Zarb as the new Ombudsman.
OMG when you think that this country has really reached rock bottom some new surprise is sprung upon us.
Maybe that’s why he married a woman 14 years his junior to forget his horrid past.
The result of very serious short-sightedness from those who were captivated by the Labour delirium election-deceitful-colourful-propaganda.
In over a year we have come to know who’s in and who’s out. Wenzu-hdura-Mintoff is definitely in.
Thank you, switchers.
I was under the impression – correct me someone if I am wrong – that one of the proposals of the committee chaired by Judge Giovanni Bonello and set up immediately after the last election with the task of proposing changes for the better administration of justice, was to set up some sort of judicial appointments mechanism.
These exist in all European states – even those which have only recently emerged from under Soviet domination. This enables candidates to the bench to be properly scrutinized by a body independent of the Executive – scrutinized for legal competence, judicial skills, absence of undesirable personality traits and undesirable connections, among others – in such a way that the appointment is not left entirely in the hands of the Executive.
Today even the appointment of the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales is subject to a similar procedure. Such a mechanism exists in our law (through the Commission for the Administration of Justice), but it is optional and not mandatory.
Did the PM at least seek the advice of the Commission for the Administration of Justice in connection with this latest appointment and with others made since Judge Bonello’s committee finalised its work? Of course, Dr Mintoff’s appointment may turn out to be an excellent choice — only time will tell — but that is, of course, not the point.
Excellent piece of journalism. Facts we all knew about in the day, but all and sundry were scared stiff to mention even to themselves.
Should be read by the younger generation.
And to the switchers, simply, shame, shame on you.
Dan lanqas qatt ma jkun fl-awli tal-qorti – kif ser jippretendi li jaghti l-gudizzji! Hadilu mela lil siehbu r-Rabti Toni Abela!
I don’t like Wenzu, but I can’t help, but feel sorry that he had to go through that messed up shit.
Mhux sewwa nsemmu lil Mintoff u Lorry Sant. Dawk mejtin, Alla jahfrilhom. Mhux sewwa.
Sewwa qed tajd Bukster hijjja. Kinu irgil sew wisq biex issa tigi di Deffni u taqla dawn l-iskeletri u qlajjiet kolla. Di Deffni ada qas addiela mit-tkaxkira li hadet u qed tinfexx f’haddiehor. ahjar tmur titfarfar u tidlek naqa lasolin.
U ghandu x’jahfrilhom ta!
Alla jahfrilhom zgur Baxxter ghaliex inkella jnittnulu l-infern u jkollu l-inkwiet mal-Greens.
Isn’t a judge appointed with the consent of 75% of Parliament?
This follows that the Nationalist members in opposition approved his nomination.
What is going on?
[Daphne – No. Judges are impeached by a two-thirds vote in parliament.]
Does anyone remember the white streamer with” LORRY XEWKA F’ SORM MINTOFF” painted in red .hanging in Paola Square during election time in the 80s?
The Bonello Commission Report served only one purpose and that was to make some noise and create a couple of photoshoots. It is was never intended to go any further than that.
‘The Speaker looked at the photographs and ordered that the envelope be sealed and locked up.’
So how do we know what was in the envelope?
Simple and I had been given reliable inside information.
A number of Members of Parliament had a good look before the Speaker’s order was carried out and naturally it then spread like wild fire.
If he’s Dom’s son, then it goes without saying that he has a right to a share of his father’s vast estate.
On the contrary they and the people who lived during those times on are still very much alive.
Politicians shape – literally – our lives. But what seems a social enterprise is nothing but a backdrop of personal gain or if it need it boil down to it, a single photo.
Politicians shape architectural styles, dress codes, ethical behaviour, educational level, what chocolate you eat, the Grundig television in the sitting room, cigarettes you smoke, paint for houses, what flowers are planted in the road… they determined your career and your education. And these things are still around us.
And today’s politicians do the same, possibly to a lesser extent because of a more liberal society. Their work has been superseded by other politicians or businessmen across the globe, unknown to most people around the globe.
Trivialities? Yes. It proves that thousands of lived their golden years in triviality, while the ones who dictated, lived their golden years pocketing the money by up keeping these trivialities.
No, they are anything but dead. They are in our and your blood stream. Let God forgive them while we, hopelessly live with it every day.
Good on Lorry – he hit two birds with one envelope.