Raymond Camilleri tendered his resignation as director-general of the government property department yesterday citing family health reasons.
The resignation was not made public and it is unclear whether it was accepted by civil service head Mario Cutajar.
Sources said Mr Camilleri asked to be redeployed elsewhere in the civil service. Attempts to contact Mr Camilleri and Mr Cutajar yesterday proved futile.
But Mr Camilleri’s resignation comes at a critical time for the government property department, which is at the centre of two ongoing investigations over the expropriation of half a building in Valletta.
It is also the second major resignation from the department after the departure of Joe Bugeja as Land Commissioner. Mr Bugeja resigned last year in the wake of the Café Premier scandal.
The Café Premier affair involved a controversial bailout of a private company to the tune of €4.2 million by the government soon after Labour was elected to power in 2013.
In a report published this year, the Auditor General had criticised the government’s actions since the deal was handled directly by the Office of the Prime Minister and the government property department was sidelined.
However, controversy returned to haunt the department when The Sunday Times of Malta revealed in June how the government expropriated half a Valletta building from Marco Gaffarena for €1.6 million in cash and land.
After the report the Prime Minister ordered an investigation into the deal by the Internal Audit and Investigations Department. The National Audit Office started its own probe.
Subsequently, this newspaper revealed a planned second expropriation involving Palazzo Verdelin, which houses the Valletta police station. The ultimate beneficiary would have also been Mr Gaffarena, who was negotiating with other owners of the palazzo to buy them out.
It is also the second major resignation from the department after the departure of Joe Bugeja as Land Commissioner
Both the IAID and NAO investigations have been extended to include the Palazzo Verdelin case.
It is not known whether Mr Camilleri’s resignation is linked to any of the investigations but in a pointed statement the Nationalist Party warned the government not to make him a scapegoat in the affair.
The PN said Mr Camilleri was being used as a “sacrificial lamb” in the Gaffarena scandal. It argued that Parliamentary Secretary Michael Falzon had personally discussed the Valletta expropriation deal with Mr Gaffarena.
He had also sent a member of his secretariat to accompany Mr Gaffarena to the Land Department, and he had personally signed the expropriation deals, the PN said.
Mr Camilleri joined the public service in 1975 and worked his way up the career ladder.
He was appointed director of estate management at the government property division in 2011 and subsequently director general in 2013.