By Karl Schembri

Security at the electoral commission’s office is vulnerable to serious flaws just as the country is gearing up for a general election, as the building has become the target of persistent thefts and acts of vandalism over the last months.
MaltaToday can reveal that a spate of criminal acts have remained unsolved over the past months. Although they are admittedly petty crimes, they expose worrying implications of the glaring lack of security surrounding the centre that will be coordinating this year’s election.
Situated in the Evans Building in Valletta, this newspaper has confirmed that until last week, a spate of robberies and acts of vandalism have taken place as the situation is seriously worrying staff working there, who are continuously ending up as suspects in inquiries that are being kept an internal affair.
The latest act to plague the widely visited building undetected and unreported to the police was the smashing of the frame with the official photo of President Eddie Fenech Adami that is found in all government departments. The frame was found smashed over the last weekend.
The most recent theft happened on Thursday 27 December when a female employee found her purse missing from her handbag which she left in her office while she went smoking in the designated room.

The purse was found later by tourists in the capital with a reported €232.94 (Lm100) missing, metres away from the Valletta police station.
The case made it to the police files given that the tourists handed the purse to the authorities, who could trace its owner thanks to the documents left inside.
A string of other thefts remains unsolved as employees and office clients alike remain clouded in suspicion.
Employees have been victims of thefts of mobile phones, car keys, wallets and purses which they kept in their desk drawers and handbags.
A television decoder has gone missing from the electoral commission’s conference room which is within a restricted area that is meant to be locked all times. Replaced by a new decoder, individuals still managed to rob the new piece of equipment later.
A couple of months ago, an electric driller used for the general maintenance of the office also went missing, while a digital camera used to capture images of all those who call at the office to renew their identity cards was stolen about a month ago.
Chief Electoral Commissioner Edward Gatt confirmed the thefts when speaking to MaltaToday yesterday night.
“All these things you’re mentioning are petty crimes and you should distinguish between the electoral office proper and the front office, as they have nothing to do with each other,” Gatt said. “There are facilities that protect material of sensitive nature, which is only handled by certain grades. So it is out of reach for most of the staff and the electoral material is always kept in safes in the strong room and sealed by the parties.”
Yet the fact that even restricted areas have been targeted still raises concerns, sources insist.
Although it is true that voting documents and other sensitive electoral material is padlocked safely, this happens only after long hours and days of handling and processing.
“This remains an alarming situation given the sensitivity of our office,” sources at the electoral commission said. “Security is of utmost importance in the preparation to an election. Whoever is behind these petty crimes might be tempted once more to cause a national sensation during the handling and processing of voting documents, security paper, ballot papers, official seals, rubber stamps, identity tags and loads of other delicate and confidential documents that can easily be ‘misplaced’, ‘lost’, ‘go missing’ or vanish just when they are needed.”
Sources say the office’s administration has also invested in security measures over the years that have cost more than €58,234 (Lm25,000), including a codec card system restricting access to staff to certain sensitive offices and corridors, separate entries for the public and staff, and a palm reader system to control entry and exits by staff from the building.
But these remain completely unsuccessful in curbing the thefts and vandalism inside the building, which is only guarded by one police officer at night between 5pm and 7am daily.
Besides the national concerns, the staff are also demoralised at being continuously under suspicion as the office administration keeps appointing one inquiry board after the other for every case to interrogate their own colleagues.
However, none of the cases have ever been solved and sources says that potentially some of the perpetrators, where inside jobs are concerned, may actually be sitting on the very inquiry boards meant to solve them.
According to the latest board of inquiry, a CCTV system should be installed with monitors to be placed in the Chief Electoral Commissioner’s own office so that he would personally observe all the footage being captured.
“I think it is high time we implement this measure,” the chief electoral commissioner conceded yesterday.

kschembri@mediatoday.com.mt