Chris Cardona: the person of trust nobody trusts

Chris Cardona is back.  He’s been appointed consultant with the Education Ministry and, according to his contract, his duties will include research.  

Cardona is not an academic. He’s not a researcher.  He’s notorious for emptying mini-bars and running massive bills on alcohol while on official business.  He was reprimanded by the Auditor General for abusing public funds.

He spent Є500,000 on travel when he was Minister. He’s famous for frequenting bars that convicted murderer Alfred Degiorgio regularly frequented. He’s even more famous for fighting bitterly to keep his phone geolocation data secret after his alleged visit to the Acapulco brothel while on government business in Germany.

Cardona was interrogated by the police after Daphne Caruana Galizia’s murder over that alleged trip to the German brothel. The Caruana Galizia murder inquiry heard an IT expert testify how, 10 days after the journalist published the Cardona Acapulco story, his company handled a hacking attempt on Caruana Galizia’s blog.  Individuals behind the attack tried to pose as Caruana Galizia and attempted to access the blog to identify the journalist’s sources.

Cardona allegedly paid his canvasser, Anthony Chetcuti, il-Biglee, to get Alfred Degiorio to murder Daphne Caruana Galizia. Cardona’s telephone number was allegedly found on one of the phones discarded by Caruana Galizia’s murderers in the sea near the potato shed when the police arrested them.

Cardona was mentioned in testimony by both middleman Melvin Theuma and Johann Cremona, a confidante of Theuma who had informed Yorgen Fenech of the existence of Theuma’s tape recordings.

Of course, Cardona denies all these allegations.  He also denied visiting that brothel in Essen. But he bust his guts trying to stop geolocation information from becoming public.  If Cardona never visited that brothel, he would have every interest in releasing that geolocation data. 

He not only sued Caruana Galizia but also requested a Є47,460 garnishee order against the journalist, crippling her financially. Cardona bragged that he was “ready to substantiate his statements through concrete evidence” and that “all the necessary evidence will be produced in court”.

But in May 2018, Cardona didn’t turn up for the court sitting.  The cases went to default and Cardona conveniently failed to reactivate the case and the whole matter was buried.

No wonder the first thing that Robert Abela did in January 2020 on becoming Prime Minister was kick Cardona out of his Cabinet.  Soon after, Cardona gave up his parliamentary seat but kept his deputy leader position. Abela wanted him to give that up too. Cardona resisted, announcing publicly that he would not resign.  On 16 June 2020, Abela forced Cardona out of the party leadership. 

The Prime Minister informed the media that “Chris Cardona will be tendering his resignation as Labour party deputy leader in the coming hours”. Abela confirmed that he had spoken to Cardona and “asked him to step aside”. Abela was right.  Cardona had no place in government or in politics.

But just five short years later, Chris Cardona is back in Abela’s government advising Cabinet ministers as a person of trust. Abela now needs everybody on board.  He cannot afford to have disgruntled former colleagues sniping at him.  So he’s buying them out, one by one. 

Cardona has come at a hefty price. He’s only contracted to work 10 hours per week, for which he will be paid Є11,000 euro per year.  But in addition, he will be getting Є25,920 in allowances. 

His allowances are almost three times his salary.  Cardona will be paid Є20,000 in expertise allowance – of course, we know what Cardona is an expert at, and it’s certainly not education.  He’s getting another Є4,320 in car and expenses allowance and a further Є1,600 communication allowance.

Cardona has been in the post since February.  Abela’s Labour kept his obscene appointment and even more obscene remuneration secret. His contract was only obtained by The Times of Malta through a freedom of information request.

Now that the nation knows, Education Minister Clifton Grima has been distancing himself from his appointment and blaming his junior minister, Keith Azzopardi Tanti.  “He (Cardona) was appointed by the parliamentary secretary… Chris Cardona has the necessary qualifications…. There is no reason why Chris Cardona should not provide his services,” Grima said.

The Minister tried to defend Abela’s rehabilitation of  Cardona: “If you look at why he was appointed and his track record as minister of the economy and what he achieved…”. If Cardona is so amazing, why did Abela kick him out of his Cabinet, parliament and the deputy leadership in 2020?  And why bring him back as person of trust now?

Robert Abela needs all the help he can get.  He wants everybody on his side.  He’s spending our money like there’s no tomorrow to guarantee his own preservation. Latest polls show that Abela is only 8.6 percentage points ahead of PN contender Alex Borg.  That must feel too close for comfort. Once the PN leadership is decided, that lead may swiftly be eroded.

The Central Bank has just issued a damning report highlighting Abela’s profligate spending.  Malta’s net expenditure increased by 14% in 2024.  That’s more than double the rate agreed by Malta with the European Commission of 5.9%. Malta’s finance ministry agreed to maintain the increase in spending to those levels.  But Abela is desperate. 

He cannot afford to cut back spending if he wants to stay in Castille for much longer.  Now we know where he’s spending our money – on people like Cardona.

How can Abela face the public? In the midst of an Є11 billion debt crisis and a staggering 14% increase in spending, Abela continues to fritter away our money on Cardona.  He’s paying Cardona Є20,000 in expertise allowance alone – for just 10 hours a week.  He’s paying him Є37,000 a year for, of all things, “research”. No wonder they kept it secret.