PL president fails to produce ‘free cruise’ receipts

Aqra dan l-artiklu bil-Malti

Labour Party President Ramona Attard has failed to produce any receipts connected to a free cruise around the Mediterranean she took with the Institute of Tourism Studies (ITS) CEO, Pierre Fenech, despite claiming on social media that she paid for her trip.

Following The Shift’s report that the former aide of disgraced former prime minister Joseph Muscat was also seen accompanying her partner on a free Mediterranean Cruise gifted to her partner Andrew Debattista when the company was negotiating a deal with the Institute for Tourism Studies (ITS), Attard took to social media to criticise the journalists reporting it.

Insisting that she was a guest of her partner, a senior manager at ITS and in the company of ITS CEO Pierre Fenech and his wife Romina, she wrote that she paid for her flights and the cruise out of her pocket.

Yet she failed to produce receipts when asked by The Shift.

The Shift reported that Attard was among guests invited by Viking Cruises – a Swiss-based cruise liner company – to attend a ceremony inaugurating their latest luxury ocean liner in Ancona, Italy, and then touring the Mediterranean aboard the vessel for five days.

At the time of the cruise, the ITS was negotiating with Viking Cruises about possibly training some of their staff at the Institute.

Ramona Attard’s partner was invited after Frank Fabri, a former permanent secretary who took up a job at the ITS after being forced to resign, declined the invitation.

According to the ITS CEO who also doubles as the CEO of another government organisation, the Mediterranean Conference Centre, their acceptance of this ‘gift’ was approved by Tourism Minister Clayton Bartolo’s ministry.

Ramona’s gravy train

Ramona Attard, a junior reporter for Labour’s TV station until 2013, has taken advantage of her political ties since Labour returned to power.

Immediately after the 2013 general elections, she became chief of staff of then-parliamentary secretary Ian Borg.

After a few months, she joined former home affairs minister Manuel Mallia as deputy chief of staff but kept all her former perks as Mallia had “given her extra duties”.

In that position, she was also put on a board related to a promotion exercise of senior army officers, described as “vitiated” by the Ombudsman.

After Mallia’s forced resignation due to a shooting perpetrated by his driver, she joined Kurt Farrugia, acting as a communications advisor at the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM).

While working full-time at the OPM on a €50,000 package, Attard also found the time to follow a five-year full-time course at the University of Malta, graduating as a lawyer in 2017.

Since then, she has been on various government retainers, providing legal services.