UK-based Peter Vella gets MTA London job instead of Ambassador Marisa Micallef

Peter Vella

Marisa Micallef, who has been fired from her post as Malta’s ambassador to Washington after being out on ‘gardening leave’ for the last two months, has been angling for a compensatory post as UK director at the Malta Tourism Authority’s office in London, but has been beaten to it by UK-based Peter Vella.

Vella’s appointment was announced last week in the British travel press, but not in Malta. The Malta Tourism Authority has confirmed his appointment but has given no official start date. Meanwhile, Michael Piscopo serves as interim director.

The post had been vacant since April, when the previous incumbent, Alex Incorvaja, completed his six-year stint and returned to Malta to rejoin the hotel trade.

The government will now have to keep Ms Micallef quiet with another state-sponsored position, because it cannot afford to have a former Labour Party employee, who was privy to many campaign secrets, turn nasty.

The prime minister knows that Ms Micallef cannot be trusted to do the decent thing because it was he who bought the full advantage of her backstabbing qualities, by putting her on the party payroll after she rounded on PM Gonzi for refusing to give her the job she wanted – as UK director at the Malta Tourism Authority’s London office.

Peter Vella, who has spent most of his working life in Britain, was executive director of business development at Birmingham International Airport until 2009.