Nationalist Party councillor and environment campaigner Charlot Cassar yesterday resorted to legal avenues after receiving what he described as two “vindictive transfers” in the space of a few days.
He explained how from a position with Transport Malta, he soon found himself at the Ministry for European Affairs and Equality and later at the Fisheries Department.
Mr Cassar, a Marsascala local councillor who contested the last general election on the PN ticket, said that he had been transferred from Transport Malta without any valid explanation.
In his judicial protest, filed on his behalf by industrial relations lawyer Andrew Borg Cardona, Mr Cassar said he was employed as a senior manager with Transport Malta in February 2011 on a three-year, fixed-term contract.
In November 2012, he renegotiated another three-year contract and in February 2015, his employment conditions changed to that of an indefinite contract after having been in employment for more than four years.
Public service not to be used as a tool for politically vindictive acts
Mr Cassar said on July 18 he was ordered to report for work at the Equality Ministry and a few days later received yet another order to report for work at the Fisheries Department. He obeyed all orders, always under protest, adding that there was no valid reason for his transfer.
Mr Cassar called on Transport Malta to confirm that he is still its employee and that all his work conditions would be respected.
In a statement issued later, Mr Cassar said: “If the aim of this transfer was to silence me from criticising the government, particularly on environment issues, they have failed.”
He said the public service was there to serve all people, and not to be used as a tool for politically vindictive acts by the party in government.
In a statement, Nationalist Party MP Hermann Schiavone expressed solidarity with Mr Cassar, and anyone else who was a victim of vindictive transfers by the government.
The PN insisted that Prime Minister Joseph Muscat should reverse the transfer order.