Yesterday, the indefatigable Times of Malta journalist, Jacob Borg, asked Prime Minister Robert Abela whether he rented his Żejtun villa to Russian applicants of the Maltese golden passport scheme. Robert Abela’s reply was positive. Robert Abela was also the lawyer to Russian oligarch and Maltese passport holder Evgeny Filobokov. Filobokov wired €166,832 to Willerby Trade Inc., an offshore company directed by the corrupt accountant of the Joseph Muscat cabal, Brian Tonna.
Robert Abela’s career is an unbridled history of rent-seeking. However, the problem is not just the lucrative government contracts he received for giving little or no value for the public money awarded to him (his previous work at the Planning Authority is now done inhouse), it is also his constant history of influence peddling at the Planning Authority and service to crooks indirectly related to the Labour Party. An example about the former is when he allegedly turned a €600,000 villa he purchased at a discount into a €2 million asset after regularising its development illegalities during the same time he was making the purchase. I can confirm that in other cases of much less significance in material nature, Robert Abela did call up other politicians and government officials asking them for irregular favours. I am sure that he did the same when his interests were greater.
Then there is his history as a lawyer to crooks who are indirectly related to the Labour Party such as his services to an alleged fraudster and serial criminal Chris Borg who apparently has strong ties with the Labour Party. Robert Abela also gave legal services to Il-Maksar brothers who are currently being accused of supplying the bomb which killed Daphne Caruana Galizia (Jason Micallef is their cousin).
I’m not someone who believes in coincidences having studied history most of my life. When running for Labour Party leader, many of Robert Abela’s allies spread the narrative that Robert was a good guy sitting on the periphery of power waiting for his time to come and leave his mark. This narrative implied that Robert compromised with Joseph Muscat and his cabal for the sake of his political ambitions and not because he was part of the Joseph Muscat cabal. When his time came, he took over.
I don’t think so.
In Robert Abela we see a constant history of rent-seeking and criminality associated with the Labour Party. So much for being the son of Malta’s President of the Republic: the young lawyer prince had to contend by offering his services to low-life criminals and Russian oligarchs buying Maltese passports. I don’t wonder why he could not secure any respectable clients and depended on low-life scum and government contracts to grow his wealth: he is idiotic, corrupt, banal, and made of pure rent-seeking blood. This man knows nothing else but to snatch and grab, loot and peddle, lie and act. He is as banal and stupid as they come and he genuinely believes that we believe his desperate public act.
Robert Abela’s history inevitably explains why he has no friends outside Malta and is not respected. He is completely cut off from any respectable social circle. His best friends and greatest supporters in terms of special interest groups are building contractors, property speculators, the hunting lobby, the car racing lobby and other assorted special interest groups with no relevance to the economy (the model-aeroplane enthusiasts). On Twitter he doesn’t even have the following of an average influencer and most of his followers are Labour Party activists and members, some of whom were asked deliberately to make accounts specifically to follow him.
With this history and background, more context is given to his crass stupidity in defending the Maltese golden passport scheme, dragging even further down our international reputation. Thanks to Robert Abela’s stupidity, Malta is currently an object of ridicule and s
anction from the US Congress. And US congressmen speak openly of our national embarrassment that is our Prime Minister.
You can believe Robert Abela’s narrative that he is the good guy who has come out of the shadows, but the emerging truth is a bit different. Robert Abela’s history is already written and it only needs to emerge out of his convoluted lies and propaganda. Historically, he has been nothing more than a useful tool for criminals like Joseph Muscat. I don’t think that when he became Prime Minister he changed. He is not a double-agent of good penetrating evil, neither he is the Labour politician who will redeem Labour of its sins. On the contrary. Robert Abela is a toxic byproduct of our 2019 crisis. The longer he stays in power, the longer our institutions and rule of law remain in tatters.
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