The National Council for the Maltese Language said on Friday it had “full confidence” in its president, Olvin Vella, “an academic who has worked incessantly in favour of the Maltese language as his aspiration and his only agenda”.
Vella recently found himself in hot water following the publication of legal notice in August setting up the Centre of the Maltese Language, to be headed by former PBS head of news Norma Saliba.
The centre, which was established without any prior warning, is to serve as the council’s “administrative, organisational and operational organ”.
Saliba will head the centre despite not having any qualifications in the language.
Vella had initially welcomed the development and Saliba’s appointment.
However, the council backtracked shortly afterwards, filing a judicial protest to scrap Saliba’s appointment claiming that it is “illegal” as the council was not consulted over plans to open the centre and did not receive a draft of the legal notice for its feedback.
In a reply, the culture ministry vehemently denied these claims, arguing that Vella was consulted directly by permanent secretary Joyce Dimech.
And in a counter-protest, the government highlighted Saliba's managerial experience.
In its statement on Friday, the council said that when Vella became aware too late of the manipulations and the seriousness of the situation, he offered his resignation but council members unanimously refused to accept it because they realised he had unwittingly fallen into a trap that was set for him.
“None of us ever asked the president to resign, as has been falsely claimed by some. That claim was a fabrication that appeared in the media to try and split and weaken the council,” it said
The council said that in the protest against the imposition of “the illegal setting up of the so-called Centre for the Maltese Language by Minister Owen Bonnici”, it voted freely from the very beginning and was always united together and with its president.
It deplored the fact that those who are qualified and have worked all their lives with a spirit of dedication and without remuneration in favour of the language were being sidelined and treated in the worst possible manner in preference to people who are unqualified in the subject, for reasons other than the good of the Maltese language.
