Dazed and confused
Published:
October 22, 2014 at 8:36pm
Malta Freeport Corporation CEO Aaron Farrugia
Posted by Lunarossa:
This morning, I flew back to Malta from Rome with Air Malta.
Malta Freeport Corporation’s CEO, Aaron Farrugia, was at the boarding-gate. We started boarding and he was in front of us. He gave the gate agent his boarding card and she immediately told him: “Sorry sir, but this is an Air Malta flight and not an Alitalia one.”
He stood there, dazed and confused, while she repeated that. Then without saying a word he moved away and slowly went off to search for the Alitalia gate.
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First time he boarded a plane alone.
Next time he will go by registered mail or accompanied courier service, may be hand-carried, with a packed lunch.
Aaron Farrugia must be used to hamalli travel set-ups with Hamilton Tours, where the tour leader collects all passports, tickets, boarding passes,etc, and where the same tour leader then explains to the group of hamalli what to do step-after-step including indicating the seat number where they should sit.
P Shaw
Oh come on, that is nonsense. Criticise, by all means, Norman as a High Commissioner and lackey, but do not rubbish his business which he should have been asked to give up since he assumed his diplomatic role.
@ Joe Fenech
Ghandu farka ragun, nghiduha.
The Freeport Labour Government CEO flies Alitalia not Air Malta.
Fejnhu s-Super One?
Is this one who has five degrees – university degrees not thermometer degrees?
Ma ttihx tort miskin. “Malta” and “Italia” look so similar. Not to mention the near identical logos.
And both have two As, while Luciano has two eyes but, apparently, no brain.
Qas jaf x’laqtu jigifieri… U ghalfejn ma juzax il-linja nazzjonali tal-ajru?
Mur giebu f’xi board meeting dan.
Imur ifittex il “boarding gate” biex jidhol ghal-meeting.
Who let an unaccompanied minor check in in the first place, anyway?
The idiot. Another one promoted way beyond his abilities.
The Malta Freeport is doing well thanks to his predecessors and in spite of him.
‘Maaaa! Maaaa! Ma’ tellghunix maaaa! Ghidilhom maaaa!’
Well, to be fair, these things happen even to the best of us. In my line of work it’s not the first time I’ve seen perfectly capable and well-respected executives making such genuine mistakes, often caused by mounting pressures at work, at home or both.
I am not defending this person’s record or appointment, far from it, but rather pointing out that in reality there is little correlation between such mistakes and the real capabilities of a person. For example, Peter Serracino Inglott was famously absent-minded and prone to these things, but a brilliant person nonetheless.
[Daphne – Interestingly, you cite to back up your argument one of those cases in which extreme absent-mindedness is misread as a signifier of extreme intellectual brilliance. But absent-mindedness is just that. Peter Serracino Inglott was by no means brilliant. In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Brilliance does not exist as an intangible. It is judged and assessed by tangible results.]
The CEO of any high-profile organization should be judged by his overall performance after a number of years, not by boarding the wrong airport gate. I hope we can all agree to that.
Although I feel that some people think that such mistakes are somehow symptoms of the ‘Labour gene’ borne out of an inherent lack of class, style, decorum and the old-fashioned definition of manhood.
There someone said it finally.
Can we have a show of hands? I’d like to think there are more than three of us.
I find this issue petty – when there are far more wide-reaching things going on in the country particularly at parliament.
Everyone makes mistakes, particularly if you’re rushing and late in an airport. The CEO most probably did not book the flights himself, and was just aware of the time of the flight.
[Daphne – You can’t get to a boarding-gate without a boarding-pass, Barabbas. The boarding-pass carries all the flight details, with the airline most prominent. That’s exactly how the woman at the gate knew he shouldn’t be on that flight. I don’t think it’s petty at all. I think this means he was dazed to the point of total distraction. ‘Everyone makes mistakes’ – yes, and when you’re Barabbas Borg it doesn’t matter much, but when you’re a state corporation chairman, it does.]
“Jekk biex wasalt l-Italia qbadt l-Alitalia, mela biex immur lura Malta irrid naqbad l-Air Malta.”
Let’s call a spade a spade. The poor guy is an idiot and should never have been appointed CEO of Malta Freeport. Would he have been appointed had he not been a Labour Party activist and campaign worker who ‘wrote’ the PL electoral programme?
Don’t you know that ignorance is one of the top qualities one needs in order to get a top government post or appointment.