[1] He started his education at a Catholic school in Tripoli, then returned to Malta with his family and attended De La Salle College at Cottonera.
[2] Since the times of Labour premier Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici, in 1979-1980 and then from 1984 to 2000,[3]: 150 Mario Vella served at the Malta Development Corporation (MDC), up to chief executive officer.
He returned to the helm of the MDC (first as Policy and Planning Coordinator, and soon after as CEO) in 1996-1998 at the time of Alfred Sant's Labour government, during which years he supported the rise of Joseph Muscat in the party.
[3]: 150 In 1998, with the return of the Nationalists to government, Mario Vella left the MDC and switched to the private sector, working as director of foreign direct investment services for the consulting firm Grant Thornton in Malta.
[2] In 2013 Vella was appointed by the new Labour government as chairman of the MDC's successor organisation, the national economic development and investment promotion agency, Malta Enterprise,[5] where he served for 3 years.
[10] His nomination raised criticism by the opposition as well as by three Labour ministers (including his future successor Edward Scicluna), who would have preferred the more bipartisan choice of Rene Saliba.
[11] In 2017, Central Bank employees complained with the media that the new Governor’s Award Scheme was at risk of political bias, as its selection panel included two former General Workers' Union officials.
[14] In part, Vella’s philosophy is deconstructivist, tenaciously exposing the internal conflicts that tend to undercut the asserted meaning of any text.
When published, the book was quite exceptional for it uncharacteristically dealt with the analysis and criticism of another Maltese philosopher, and a living one at that - a first since Angelo Pirotta's investigation into the philosophy of Anastasio Cuschieri in the early 20th century.