Some people have “hypocrisy” written on their forehead

Dominic Fenech is a major rent-seeking academic, being bizarrely responsible for two academic administrative posts – Head of Faculty of Arts and Head of the Department of History. He is known to run the Faculty and the Department as his own personal fiefdoms and clubs and under the Labour administration, he has been quite open about this nepotism. Today, he also wants to re-assure us that he is a dedicated and loyal Labourite, to the extent that had he been Leader of the Labour Party, he would have shut down the door to all renegades opposing it. His rather bizarre rant was liked and replied to by various students, academics and prospective employees of the Faculty of Arts all cheering Dominic saying “you have our vote”. Some of these people cheering him have never even voted Labour in their lives (and would surely not vote for him any way), but people ingratiate with Dominic anyway because they need him to get them employed at the Faculty of Arts. However, Dominic’s hot air over Labour is also an ingratiating act to his superiors so it is like a food chain of ass-kissing and ingratiation by people who all aspire to have a paycheque by the University of Malta – and it is the reason why I am not part of this carnival.

In reality, Dominic’s nepotism and fraudulent calls for Stalinist partisanship are simply shows of ingratiation to his bosses which say “Look how good I am to you, defend my position and I’ll be a loyal puppy”. Dominic, was in fact and indeed a Labour Party renegade for many years until Joseph Muscat took over. More precisely, Dominic fought with Alfred Sant because the latter did not allow him to follow his leadership ambitions (Dominic Fenech wanted to be deputy leader of the Labour Party and Alfred Sant opposed him). In a very famous meeting, Fenech and Sant had at the Labour Party quarters in Hamrun, Dominic Fenech stormed out of the Party quarters in anger only to never vote Labour again for many years, all the while bitching and telling us how bad Alfred Sant was and that he was proudly not voting Labour.

Dominic Fenech was also a close friend of Lino Spiteri, the previous Minister of Finance who helped and abetted Tumas Fenech grow his empire in his early years. After Lino Spiteri’s death, Fenech organized a Festschrift  in his memory. Given that Lino Spiteri will be featured in my research on the history of the Tumas business empire, I advise Dominic to update his Festschrift. It’s going to be interesting.