The former Telemalta chairman Tony Debono, well known for his strong links to the Labour government of the 1980s and his long-standing relationship with the Tumas Group, is leading the negotiations for the Nationalist Party’s mobile telephony venture, with the Malta Communications Authority.
Once reviled by the PN for his role at the service of the Labour government, Debono is now helping the party set up its mobile phone offering with GO plc.
Debono yesterday refused to comment with this newspaper, stating he did not intend to speak about anything. “Leave me alone, I will not say anything,” Debono’s said.
He also refused to comment on whether he is acting in his own personal capacity, or on somebody else’s behalf, and whether or not he is being paid for his services.
Debono started off his telecommunications career in 1982, when as a civil servant he was elevated to private secretary to the Labour minister of health.
He was then made general manager of the state national telecommunications company Telemalta Corporation, the forebear of Maltacom and now GO plc.
As general manager, he survived different ministers responsible for telecommunications, as well as parliamentary secretaries, chairmen and directors.
Debono had been instrumental in persuading the UN’s International Telecommunications Union to present a master plan to then Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adami in the early 1990s. Subsequently, the official photograph of the ITU’s secretary-general presenting the master plan to Fenech Adami featured a strategically-placed Tony Debono in the middle – the photograph surprised his politically left-leaning friends.
He continued to lead Telemalta up to the first few months of Alfred Sant’s government in 1996. From the first days of the Sant administration, it was evident that the new Labour government had no place for Debono, now CEO of the Corporation.
Sant proceeded to appoint Noel Zarb Adami as the short-term chairman of Telemalta, side-tracking Tony Debono, who was instead given a generous golden handshake to move out of Telemalta.
For some time, Debono kept a low profile while heading a minor internet service provider.
But as the short-lived Labour government came to an end in 1998, and the Nationalist Party came back in power, Tony Debono was reinstated to the now semi-privatised Maltacom plc.
When Maurice Zarb Adami (brother to Noel) was appointed as chairman of Maltacom, Tony Debono was appointed as consultant. News of the appointment led the Labour media to label the handout as yet another job for the blue-eyed boys in the Nationalist administration.
With the appointment of Stephen Muscat as chief executive of Maltacom, Tony Debono was reinstated as general manager of international affairs, a post that did little to console his dashed ambition for CEO. But he consolidated his career by taking on high-profile chairmanships of the International Telecommunications Union bodies for Europe, and the Commonwealth. His constant presence in the media was also the envy of many careerists.
Yet again, Debono would find himself offered another golden handshake when the new owners of Maltacom plc – Dubai-based Tecom – took over the company to form GO plc.
For the last couple of years, Debono has not been involved in the telecommunications circle until lately, when he returned as the Nationalist Party’s ‘emissary’ to set up its mobile phone service.
He has also served in various roles in the Tumas Group and is at present the secretary of the Tumas Fenech Foundation for Journalism.
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