Malta government head of communications emails Brussels press saying “Ignore Daphne Caruana Galizia”

On Wednesday, the Brussels-based European news portal, Politico, reported in its daily briefing the resignation of Manfred Galdes, chief of Malta’s Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit, which is set up under the country’s anti-money-laundering laws. With its briefing note, Politico included a link to this website, which broke the story.

Kurt Farrugia, head of government communications, immediately emailed them, telling them that they should ignore me. Għax taf inti, dik saħħara u ħadd ma jagħti kasa.

It is indicative of their self-deluding ignorance that they themselves have come to believe the warped picture they painted of me, and it is perfectly ridiculous that Malta’s head of government communications thinks that the media outside Malta operate like the media in Malta, with cookies from Kurt.

So of course, Politico hunted down my telephone number (thank you, Neville Gafa) and rang me instead – as any real journalist would with a great tip-off like that from the government’s communications chief.

It’s already happened before. When the EU Observer quoted me and then carried a piece I wrote as the Panama Papers scandal flooded over the government, Lara Boffa – girlfriend of the Malta Council for Science and Technology’s executive chairman, Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, who he put abusively on the payroll there – emailed them to slander me and say that they shouldn’t quote me or use anything I write. And she actually signed it.

Politico has responded, in a later daily briefling, to Kurt Farrugia’s email, with an amused “the Maltese government wants you to know…”.

Kurt Farrugia, head of government communications