Cannabis boss Mariella Dimech on €82,000 a year

Tista’ taqra l-artiklu bil-Malti hawn.

Mariella Dimech, a former activist against the legalisation of cannabis use, has been hired on an €82,000 financial package by the government to act as the first executive chair and CEO of a new government agency regulating the use of cannabis.

Handpicked by Minister Owen Bonnici, without a call for applications, Dimech has been given a three-year contract to manage a new law legalising the drug.

According to her contract, seen by The Shift, Dimech will answer directly to the minister and will be earning a basic salary of more than €64,000 a year. Yet her take-home pay, funded by taxpayers, will catapult to a staggering €82,000 a year through a series of perks, including a performance bonus of almost €10,000 a year, apart from other generous allowances covering her transport, communications and entertainment expenses.

Dimech will be occupying a double role, that of CEO and chairman of an authority yet to be set up. Her contract does not stipulate who determines her annual performance and the payment of her €10,000 annual bonus. Sources close to the government told The Shift that, initially, Dimech’s performance will be evaluated by the minister.

Apart from setting up the new Authority, which will be tasked with regulating the use of cannabis, including awarding licences to newly formed organisations involved in growing and selling the drug, Dimech’s authority will also be required to monitor the effectiveness of this legislation on society and gauge whether it leads to an increase in social problems.

Dimech became a psychotherapist after graduating from the University of Malta as a mature student.

Dimech started her work life as an air hostess in Saudi Arabia. After working for a short time in the tourism industry, she joined the leading provider of drug rehabilitation services, Caritas Malta, as a facilitator and progressed to overseeing rehabilitation programmes for drug users. At the time, she opposed the legalisation of cannabis, insisting publicly that the drug’s legalisation would be harmful to society.

Dimech has also presented a number of state-sponsored TV discussion programmes on PBS, produced by her brother Saviour Balzan.

To date, Mariella Dimech is the only full-time employee of the cannabis Authority, while the government-appointed board includes Janice Formosa Pace, Nadine Brincat, Sina Bugeja, Charles Cassar, Gabriel Farrugia, Paul Micallef, Charles Scerri and Joe Reno Vella.

Caritas rejected an invitation from Minister Bonnici to nominate a director on the board on the basis of its opposition to the law enacted by the government last January.