It pays to be the prime minister’s first cousin once removed

This story about the Maltese Schengen visa scam in Algeria is fascinating. But what is more fascinating still is how the prime minister’s first cousin once removed (his father’s first cousin) – Robert Falzon, an ordinary employee at Malta Enterprise – was, in December 2013, appointed Malta Enterprise’s “commercial representative” in Algeria. The following March, he was made Malta’s consul-general in that country while still technically working for Malta Enterprise.

Aside from the corrupt nepotism/cronyism, this appears to be the new Taghna Lkoll practice of having consuls-general answer to Malta Enterprise rather than to the Foreign Ministry. Mrs Konrad Mizzi is in the same position: officially Malta’s consul-general in Shanghai, she is actually under contract to Malta Enterprise and not to the Foreign Ministry.

Robert Falzon’s son, Zach Falzon – the prime minister’s second cousin – was put on the state payroll after March 2013 at the incoming government’s newly-created Frankenstein’s monster, Identity Malta, which is a sort of glorified Labour Party club that controls and has access to private and personal data on everybody who holds a Maltese identity card.

And Robert Falzon’s sister (obviously also the prime minister’s first cousin once removed), Sonia Maria Vassallo, has since March 2013 also been put on the state payroll at the government’s Pharmacy of Your Choice agency.

Maltese society is very odd and primitive. An Opposition politician is expected to resign his seat in parliament for having received gifts from a corrupt businessman when he was a cabinet minister, but the incumbent prime minister can put his friends and family on the state payroll, appoint them to high office, and acquire two state-funded places at the private care home Villa Messina for his wife’s parents, and people are OK with that.

Joseph Muscat’s first cousin once removed – Taghna Lkoll appointee in Algeria post March 2013