When Nerik Mizzi and other Maltese politicians were deported to Uganda

By the late 1930s Malta was deeply divided between cultural orientations: one faction embraced British imperial alignment, while another, led by the Nationalist Party and Enrico Mizzi, advocated preservation of Italian language and culture, the italianità.

With the outbreak of war and rising fears of subversion, British authorities invoked emergency legislation aimed at detaining individuals suspected of being disloyal. The British Defence Regulations of 1939 allowed internment but did not authorize deportation of British subjects or Maltese citizens outside their homeland.

Deportation to Uganda

On 30 May 1940, 47 to 48 Maltese individuals including high-profile figures such as Nationalist Party co-leader Dr Enrico Mizzi, Chief Justice Sir Arturo Mercieca, intellectual Herbert Ganado, clerics and dockyard workers were arrested without formal accusation and detained in various locations: Fort San Salvatore (notably situated over fuel depots), Corradino prison, and later St Agatha’s Convent in Rabat.

On 3 January 1942, officials issued an “Area Order” notifying these internees of impending deportation. The Maltese Civil Courts ruled subsequently that the Governor lacked the legal authority to deport British subjects. Nonetheless, the Council of Government swiftly passed emergency legislation, overriding these judicial objections, and two Nationalist members fought against it, including Sir Ugo Pasquale Mifsud, who collapsed during debate and died two days later.

Despite a Court of Appeal later declaring the deportations illegal, the process had already been executed: on 13 February 1942, approximately 41 to 43 detainees were loaded onto HMS Breconshire, transported via Alexandria, and then sent on a grueling 3,400 km journey to internment camps in Uganda.

Harrowing Journeys and Camp Conditions

The voyage to Egypt was perilous. Axis air raids struck the ship some twenty times, and the Breconshire narrowly survived multiple attacks. Once in East Africa, the internees endured harsh conditions in Ugandan camps: they performed forced manual labour, lived in unsanitary quarters, and suffered outbreaks of malaria under a relentless sun.

Personal Toll and the Weight of Silence

For those affected, the consequences were deeply personal. Vincenzo Bonello’s son, Giovanni, recounted that correspondence home was heavily censored, “literally look[ing] like lace,” a poignant reminder of how war silenced families.

None of the deported individuals was ever charged or convicted of treason. While a few held sympathies toward Italian culture, the vast majority were intellectuals and professionals, victims not of proven disloyalty, but of political expediency, cultural bias, and wartime paranoia.

Nerik Mizzi's Return from Uganda and Official Reckoning

On 8 March 1945, the deportees were repatriated to Malta, returning to political and professional life despite earlier injustices. Enrico Mizzi resumed his role in the Nationalist Party and was elected Prime Minister in 1950, though he died in office that December. Herbert Ganado similarly returned and, after a brief political venture, shaped post-war Malta’s drive toward expanded suffrage and civil rights. Sir Walter Dobbie, the Governor who had sanctioned the deportation, resigned in the wake of legal condemnation.

This episode stands among Malta’s most troubling wartime legacies. It illuminates how democratic norms can be suspended under duress and how power and prejudice can override law. The deportees were neither proven saboteurs nor convicted traitors. Instead, Malta temporarily sacrificed its civic values to geopolitical fears, exacting a heavy toll on individuals who would later shape its post-war identity.