Bank of Valletta is refusing to give details as to whether an ad hoc special early retirement arrangement given to former parliamentary secretary Michael Falzon remains or has been reviewed.
The Times of Malta reported yesterday that, instead of returning to his former job at the bank, Dr Falzon was engaged as a consultant by the Grand Harbour Regeneration Corporation, a State entity.
“The bank has already commented extensively on this issue in the past months and the matter was also explained to the bank’s shareholders during the chairman’s address at the banks’ annual general meeting held in December 2015. We have nothing further to add,” a spokesman said.
When it was pointed out that since John Cassar White’s address, Dr Falzon lost his job as junior Cabinet member and was now employed by a different entity, the spokesman still declined from making any further comments.
When details about Dr Falzon’s special early retirement package emerged, the bank described it as an ad hoc arrangement due to Dr Falzon’s becoming a junior minister.
The bank has already commented extensively on this issue in the past months
Unlike other colleagues granted early retirement, Dr Falzon was given the option of returning to the bank if he lost his job as a member of Cabinet.
Mr Cassar White had told shareholders during the annual general meeting that “if Dr Falzon returns to the bank before the end of the legislature he has to return a major part of his retirement benefits (€260,000) to the bank”.
He also said Dr Falzon had up to the end of the legislature to decide whether to return to the bank or not. “He would then not be able to return”, he had said.
However, following his resignation from Cabinet last January in the wake of the Gaffarena scandal, Dr Falzon, who retained his seat in Parliament, did not return to his old job at the bank’s legal office but instead joined the GHRC.
Asked whether Dr Falzon could keep working at GHRC till the end of the legislature, retain the €260,000 and then decide to return to the bank without returning any of the sum, the bank spokesman did not reply.
A spokesman for the Transport Ministry, which is responsible for the GHRC, said Dr Falzon was recruited on a full-time basis with a salary of €36,500 a year. A question about whether Dr Falzon was recruited following a call for applications remained unanswered at the time of writing.
The GHRC is chaired by Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi, a former president of the Labour Party who is running for the post of Labour’s deputy leader.
Dr Falzon, himself a former deputy leader of the party, was unavailable for comment yesterday.
*Additional reporting by Kurt Sansone.