Other 'considerations given priority over children's well-being'

"There were too many considerations at play and, sadly, the protection of our children was not the topmost priority," Family and Social Solidarity Minister Dolores Cristina said in her first reaction to Saturday's failed no confidence vote in the Malta Football Association administration, including president Joe Mifsud.

The motion calling for the resignation of the whole of the MFA's top brass was sparked off by the way the association had kept a 78-year-old groundsman working at Pace Grasso, in Paola, even after being told he had been convicted of defiling a 13-year-old boy.

The minister hit out at Dr Mifsud saying he "will be remembered, nationwide, as the MFA president who placed our children at risk". She also commented adversely on Dr Mifsud's credibility.

MFA delegates on Saturday approved a last-minute, conciliatory counter motion to the motion of no confidence tabled by a delegate on behalf of Sliema Wanderers president Robert Arrigo, a Nationalist MP, who was away on "a business trip".

As a result of the counter motion Mr Arrigo's motion was not even put to a vote.

The minister had been among the first to suggest that Dr Mifsud should resign. Eventually, Mr Arrigo moved the vote of no confidence and also raised the matter in Parliament.

However, the motion was discarded after a counter motion, avoiding the resignation issue - which was meant to be decided by secret ballot - was approved by an overwhelming 81 of the 90 delegates who cast their vote. There were only three votes against.

"Yesterday's outcome came as no surprise," Mrs Cristina said when asked for her reaction. "There were too many considerations at play and, sadly, the protection of our children was not the topmost priority.

"The waffling counter motion presented provided an opt out, a cop out and a face saver, intended only to retain the status quo," she said.

"Dr Mifsud will be remembered, nationwide, as the MFA president who placed our children at risk. And how pathetic that he should portray himself as the victim, when the only potential victims in the whole matter are our children."

The issue had made headlines after the CEO of the Foundation for Social Welfare Services, Joe Gerada, went public with the fact that the MFA had kept the groundsman working at the Pace Grasso Ground despite his warnings that he had been convicted for defiling a boy.

Besides being used for the MFA's activities, in fact, the football ground, which is government property, was also made available to children from the Guzè D'Amato School nearby.

The MFA only ended the groundsman's employment at the end of the football season last May, four months after he was sentenced.

The association had reacted to Mr Gerada's public complaint calling it "cheap propaganda campaign". In fact, the attacks against Mr Gerada and the minister continued on Saturday, when Dr Mifsud fiercely defended his position.

Mrs Cristina, however, was not impressed. "Dr Mifsud's personal tirade against me is of no importance. It was the outburst of an arrogant man who felt himself buffered by his 'football family'... His snide remarks and political insinuations are simply the weapons of a man badly in need of a defence.

"No amount of ranting and raving against me or against Mr Gerada will win Dr Mifsud any credibility. Were it to come to a contest of credibility on the issue, I have no doubt that Mr Gerada and I would win, hands down."

Mr Arrigo told The Times via telephone: "I think it's quite evident that it was all choreographed in order for Dr Mifsud to avoid facing a vote of no confidence in a secret ballot."

The vote taken on the counter motion on Saturday was not a secret one, in fact.

"That changes the whole matter," Mr Arrigo insisted.

Asked whether he could have avoided being abroad given the MFA's annual general meeting when his motion was on the agenda, a fact which Dr Mifsud raised in his speech, Mr Arrigo said that was a business trip and there was nothing he could do about it.

"I would have had no problem facing Dr Mifsud but you cannot turn down certain commitments," he said.