Żepp’s Final Farewell: How 7 September 2025 Became a Heart-Stopping National Thank-You from Malta’s Fishing Heart

Żepp’s Last Stand – How One Man’s 7 September 2025 Send-Off Became a National Love-Letter to Malta

By 09:00 on Sunday 7 September 2025, the narrow lanes of Siġġiewi were already humming like a festa loud-speaker. Elderly men in flat caps polished brass bands’ instruments outside the parish church; children in hand-me-down Ġorġ tal-Fjur costumes rehearsed their procession steps; and a battalion of aproned kazin volunteers stirred pots of rabbit stew big enough to baptise a statue. They weren’t just preparing for the village festa – they were preparing for Żepp’s last stand.

Żepp Camilleri – fisherman, storyteller, unofficial mayor of the Marsaxlokk pier and, for the last half-century, the living soundtrack of Maltese summers – had decided that 7 September was the day he would hang up his nets for good. Diagnosed with a heart condition earlier in the year, the 73-year-old declared that instead of a quiet retirement he wanted “a party so loud the Knights can hear it in Valletta.” The result was a spontaneous national pilgrimage that turned a sleepy autumn weekend into a spontaneous celebration of everything it means to be Maltese.

Local context ran thicker than fig jam. Siġġiewi, chosen because Żepp’s wife Ġemma was born beneath its honey-coloured limestone balconies, had never seen so many out-of-village number plates. Cars with Gozitan “G” stickers queued beside delivery vans from Birkirkara; even the typically empty bus to Żurrieq detoured to drop passengers at the football ground repurposed as overflow parking. By 11:00, the village square felt like a human pastizz – layers of people folding into each other, steaming with gossip, laughter, and the occasional grumble about the price of beer.

Cultural significance revealed itself in the smallest gestures. Żepp’s old luzzu, painted in the traditional yellow, red and blue and blessed by three separate priests “just in case”, was hauled onto a flat-bed truck and paraded through the streets like a relic. Teenagers who normally livestreamed gaming marathons instead live-streamed 90-year-old Nannu Salvu carving a fresh batch of kannoli tubes. A brass band segued from the hymn “Maria, Ħamilna” straight into a soca remix of “Viva Malta”, and nobody batted an eyelid – because festa, like identity, is allowed to evolve.

Then came the community impact, measured not in euros but in goosebumps. At 14:00, Żepp stood on a makeshift stage outside the Siġġiewi kazin, flanked by fishermen from Marsaxlokk, dockers from the Freeport, and the grand-children of friends who’d emigrated to Melbourne in the 1960s. He spoke for exactly 97 seconds – “Don’t remember me for the fish I caught; remember me for the stories I told” – and handed a sealed envelope to the mayor. Inside: a handwritten list of 43 apprentices, mostly under 25, whom Żepp had secretly trained over the last decade. By evening, a crowdfunding page titled “Żepp’s Fleet” had raised €27,000 in three hours to refit two ageing dghajjes as teaching boats. Corporate sponsors jumped in, but the first donation was €5 from a nine-year-old in Għaxaq who sold his PlayStation controller to contribute.

By sunset, the harbour at Marsaxlokk glowed with floating candles in recycled tuna tins – one for every story Żepp had told on the pier. Fireworks painted the sky in peacock colours while fishermen who normally compete for the best mooring spots passed around a single bottle of Kinnie, taking swigs in alphabetical order. The feast didn’t end with a bang but with a whisper: at 22:07, the church bells of Siġġiewi and Marsaxlokk rang simultaneously for 73 seconds, one chime for each of Żepp’s years, then fell silent.

Malta often measures its history in sieges, saints and EU presidencies. Yet on 7 September 2025 we added a new metric: the weight of gratitude carried on a single fisherman’s shoulders. As the last candle flickered out, one thing was clear – Żepp may have retired, but the stories he netted will keep these islands afloat for generations.