Harrods, embezzlement and an inquiry

Francine Farrugia was a young upstart in the Nationalist Party, having been elected on the Siġġiewi local council and also contested the general election. Little did anyone suspect that over a two-year period, she was siphoning off double salaries for herself from her workplace—the Malta College for Arts, Science and Technology (MCAST).

The audacity of Farrugia’s criminal behaviour is as shocking as the crime itself. She was a senior manager in MCAST’s salaries department and issued double salaries to herself. Over two years, Farrugia embezzled more than €2 million, the court heard police officers testify.

She used the money to finance a lavish lifestyle, buying property, cars and on one occasion went on a €100,000 spending spree at Harrods in London. And she did all this while holding elected office in her hometown Siġġiewi and preaching against government corruption all along. It all sounds surreal and her words on corruption, so hollow.

Farrugia did what was expected of her when she immediately resigned from the local council and all posts in the PN, the moment she was arraigned. Anything less would have been an abomination.

Understandably, Farrugia’s alleged criminal exploits have caused shock within the rank and file of the PN. Apart from the few blinded supporters, who chose to look elsewhere in an attempt to shift focus, MP Darren Carabott’s comment on Facebook captured the widespread anger and disappointment.

Carabott was right to publicly express indignation at Farrugia’s behaviour—she undermined the PN’s cause. We would have expected more PN MPs to do so without starting their statements with ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’. We would have expected anti-corruption crusaders to come out with forceful statements condemning the wrongdoing.

What Farrugia’s arraignment shows is that corruption and wrongdoing are not the monopoly of a single political party. Human frailty cuts across the political and social divide. And this is a lesson best learnt by all those who hold public office or are elected to represent voters at every level.

Bad people will always exist. Good people, who are tempted into wrongdoing, will always exist. It’s what happens when these people are found out that defines how strong-willed we are as a country to fight corruption and condemn bad behaviour and wrongdoing, whoever the perpetrator may be.

Farrugia now faces a criminal process, which we hope will not drag on for years. We will not hold our breath—there are several cases of alleged corruption, fraud and money laundering involving people who were part of the Labour government or gravitated around it and are still trudging on in court.

As for the political parties, it would be good if they carried out a soul-searching exercise. The PN needs to get off its high horse and ensure that its message is clear and unequivocal—wrongdoing by its own representatives will find no shelter in the party with no ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’. The PL needs to remove the glee off its face—it is not exactly the paragon of upright behaviour.

But there is also another dimension to the Farrugia story. Her case involved public funds—taxpayer money used to sustain an important educational institution.

It is amazing how Farrugia’s exploits continued for two whole years and went undetected by the college. Any system that has inbuilt controls would have immediately flagged the payment of double salaries. But MCAST’s system was broken. Indeed, it had already been flagged as broken in 2019 by the National Audit Office and yet nothing was done to fix it.

What was until then a hypothesis, soon turned out to be reality when Farrugia allegedly exploited this weakness to enrich herself.

Had it not been for a police investigation that appears to have started after receiving a tip off, MCAST would not have noticed.

The college has its own responsibilities to shoulder for allowing a broken system to remain in place. But so does Education Minister Clifton Grima have the responsibility to come clean on the situation.

Grima did well on Saturday to appoint an inquiry independent from the college’s external audit, to establish the facts and identify administrative shortcomings.

More importantly, Grima must make sure that any recommendations and actions suggested by the inquiry are implemented without delay.

Grima is a minister of state and it is his duty to every taxpayer that he ensures the institutions on his watch are using public funds in a diligent way.