Malta Enterprise’s ‘compromised’ Chair takes on new executive job

Malta Enterprise Chairperson William Wait, who has repeatedly faced questions over conflicts of interest and governance failures, has taken on another senior role in the private sector, becoming an executive director of Smartcare Holdings Ltd while retaining his sensitive government appointment.

The latest job, disclosed in a company announcement issued to the Malta Stock Exchange, comes despite years of controversy surrounding Wait’s extensive private business interests and his refusal to step down following the damning findings of the Jean Paul Sofia public inquiry.

The probe concluded that Malta Enterprise, under Wait’s chairmanship, allocated an industrial space to Kurt Buhagiar, one of the accused developers, who also served as Wait’s personal driver. The process adopted by ME was described as ‘shoddy’ by the inquiry.

According to the latest announcement, Wait was appointed executive director of Smartcare Holdings Ltd, effective from 15 July. Smartcare Holdings is the guarantor of the publicly listed Smartcare Finance plc bond issue and sits at the top of the group’s healthcare and elderly care operations. The owner of the company is Andrew Debattista Segond.

Wait’s latest appointment is no longer simply associated with the group through a non-executive capacity but has assumed an executive management role while continuing to chair Malta Enterprise, the government agency responsible for promoting investment and administering millions of euros in taxpayer-funded grants, incentives and industrial property to private businesses.

The latest development has reignited longstanding concerns over the compatibility of Wait’s public office with his expanding private commercial interests.

In 2023, The Shift revealed that Wait simultaneously occupied positions as director, company secretary or shareholder in 19 private companies while serving as chairman of Malta Enterprise. Several of those companies either operated in sectors falling within Malta Enterprise’s remit or had benefited from government assistance administered by the agency.

Smartcare Finance was among the companies identified in that investigation.

At the time, government sources questioned whether the chairman of Malta Enterprise could objectively oversee an agency responsible for allocating public funds to businesses while maintaining such widespread private commercial interests.

Those concerns were compounded by the findings of the Jean Paul Sofia public inquiry.

Although Wait was not personally blamed by the board of inquiry, the inquiry delivered a scathing assessment of Malta Enterprise’s handling of the Corradino industrial site allocated to developers involved in the project that led to Sofia’s death.

The inquiry described Malta Enterprise’s conduct, on Wait’s watch, as incompetent, irregular and lacking the most basic due diligence, concluding that the agency should never have issued the letter of intent that enabled the development.

Wait refused to resign, insisting that he had not been personally criticised by the inquiry and maintaining that decisions on smaller industrial sites were taken by a separate committee rather than by himself.

The Shift had also revealed that incidentally, one of the developers involved in the Corradino project, Kurt Buhagiar, had previously served as Wait’s personal driver during his tenure at the Water Services Corporation. Wait denied having played any role in approving the project but declined to say whether he had discussed the application with Buhagiar.

Despite the repeated controversies surrounding Wait’s tenure, Economy Minister Silvio Schembri, under whose political responsibility Malta Enterprise falls, has retained him as chairperson for many years.

Schembri has so far taken no action to replace Wait despite serious concerns over his extensive private business interests, questions over potential conflicts of interest, and the wider governance failures highlighted by the Jean Paul Sofia public inquiry.