Carmel Cacopardo

The Group of States Against Corruption (GRECO), the Council of Europe’s anti-corruption body, in a report published in 2019 recommended that the Maltese Government formulates an integrity strategy in order to ensure that whosoever is appointed to top executive posts is a person with a clean reputation. The matter is still pending, 6 years later.

Integrity in public life is the subject of the latest GRECO compliance report about Malta, dealing with the prevention of corruption and the promotion of integrity in public life. This 24-page report, which was published last week is part of the Fifth Evaluation Round of GRECO. It examines 23 recommendations made to Malta in 2019, only 8 of which have been fully implemented. Another 7 recommendations were partially implemented with the remaining 8 still not having been addressed.

It is GRECO’s objective to improve the capacity of its member states to fight corruption. It does this through the monitoring of their compliance with Council of Europe anti-corruption standards and recommending specific action where they are found to be lacking.

The latest GRECO compliance report on Malta is extremely worrying. It certifies a systemic deficiency in Malta’s fight against corruption. In its conclusions the GRECO report emphasises that very little progress has been registered in respect of preventing corruption and promoting integrity in central government relative to persons entrusted with top executive functions. Specifically, this GRECO report emphasises that training on integrity and ethics needs to be extended to “ministers, permanent secretaries and other senior officials”. It is pretty obvious to GRECO that awareness is quite deficient at this level. Some of us have been pointing out this obvious deficiency for ages!

It is worth recollecting that in an earlier evaluation report on Malta’s preparedness to combat corruption amongst top executive officials, published on 3 April 2019, GRECO had said that: “………… members of the central governmental institutions have been regularly targeted by public criticism for their improper behaviour, including allegations of conflicts of interest, kickbacks, favours, nepotism, cronyism, misuse of public resources and so on. They are still in office. Positions of trust have been used to hire some of the persons involved in such controversies. It has even happened that former officials who have been embroiled in dubious dealings or actions are given prominent governmental functions, in the absence of any policy requiring a clean reputation to be appointed at the highest levels.”

On this basis GRECO is insisting that an integrity strategy needs to be formulated. It is obvious that this proposal is one of those which is still not implemented. It would be quite a change in Malta if having a clean reputation is introduced as a basic requirement for public office as part of an integrity strategy regulating appointments to high office! A number of faces would most probably disappear from public life. The country would be much better off.

At the time of writing, this integrity strategy is nowhere in sight. This notwithstanding that former Principal Permanent Secretary and Secretary to Cabinet Mario Cutajar, in the forward to an OPM publication on action taken in respect of National Audit Office 2019 and 2020 reports had stated that this integrity strategy was being developed. Nothing has materialised so far, five years later.

The GRECO report recognises that the regulation of conflict of interest in the public sector as a modest step forward. However, it underlines that it is not at all clear whether this regulatory framework introduced in 2024 is applicable to persons engaged in central government in positions of trust. This problem is further compounded by the exclusion of those in positions of trust from being subject to the supervision of the Commissioner for Standards in Public Life.

The continued absence of the regulation of lobbying from Malta’s statute books is also emphasised. The GRECO report underlines that “No adequate rules have been put in place to govern and disclose to the public contacts between persons in top executive functions and lobbyists/third parties seeking to influence the decision-making process.” This lack of transparency is not conducive to good governance. It places the decision-taking process at the mercy of those who seek to exercise influence in the shadows.

Unfortunately, we have become accustomed to having more than an occasional bad apple in public office. As a country we are burdened much more than one would reasonably expect in a democratic society. A lack of transparency is not helpful in this respect. This has a direct impact on accountability. We need to ensure that public office is embedded in the basic values of integrity, the foundation for good governance.

The above and more are points which both ADPD-The Green Party as well as civil society have been harping on in the past months and years. The fact that GRECO is on the same page adds to the credibility of the local debate which the Labour Party in government continuously ignores. By not implementing the GRECO recommendation for the implementation of an integrity strategy applicable to holders of high office the labour party in government is sending one clear message: ensuring good governance is not a priority.

Carmel Cacopardo is ADPD-The Green Party’s Deputy Chairperson

published in The Malta Independent on Sunday: 7 December 2025