The Prime Minister’s former Chief of Staff Keith Schembri is back in Malta following a short holiday to Italy that raised eyebrows among a concerned public still coming to grips with the current political crisis.

Schembri first left Malta on 26th December, with it initially being reported that he had requested police permission to do so. However, it was later revealed that this was not the case, and he actually was never required to do so.

Questions were immediately raised that Schembri could be attempting to flee from the islands. At yesterday’s protest, several speakers even questioned whether Schembri had yet returned to the country.

However, sources close to Schembri told Lovin Malta that the Prime Minister’s former Chief of Staff had been back at his home in Mellieha for several days.

The police’s decision to allow Schembri to travel raised serious questions. While he is not under police bail, Inspector Keith Arnaud has confirmed under oath that Schembri remains under investigation for his potential involvement in the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia, along with a litany of other offences which include:

Tampering with evidence, leaking extensive information about the investigation, obstructing justice, and acquiring a phantom job for middleman Melvin Theuma.

Arnaud has also testified that Schembri claimed to have lost his phone the night of his arrest, and they have so far been unable to locate it.  Schembri also refused to give police his passwords to his email accounts and iCloud because they contained sensitive government information.

Meanwhile, Schembri’s office at the Labour Party headquarters is yet to be searched, while his Castille office was left unguarded and ignored by investigators for close to ten days.

Schembri is not the only disgraced public official who has been enjoying some time off, with Prime Minister Joseph Muscat going abroad no less than four times to destinations like Dubai, London, and Bethlehem.