Nationalist MP Franco Debono made a fiery speech during the debate on the censure motion against Home Affairs Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici tonight, saying 20 years would not be enough for the minister to account for his failures.
The MP did not specify how he will vote on the motion tomorrow evening, but he left little doubt, hitting out at every sector of Dr Mifsud Bonnici’s ministerial responsibilities.
He insisted that Dr Mifsud Bonnici should shoulder responsibility for the shortcomings in his ministry and should not expect praise for doing what is expected of him.
He said that that if the minister was offended on a personal basis by anything he had said, he wanted to make it clear that this was not his intention.
"On a personal basis I wish him health and wealth," Dr Debono said adding that however, he should have kept his wife out of the matter.
He said that, unlike the minister, he had not found a ready-made bed but everyone had his dignity and he managed to get to where the minister was on his own with the help of his family which had given him a good upbringing. He was strong because he was in the right, he was used to fighting on his own and would continue to do. He would not give up and would remain consistent.
Charles Mangion, a justice minister in the Labour government, had resigned on a small thing compared to the current disaster. But he had been right to resign because this was what was done in normal countries.
Dr Debono hit out at those who had claimed that the censure motion amounted to psychological violence.
“I have suffered and am suffering 20,000 more than the minister” Dr Debono said.
He complained repeatedly and bitterly that his motion for reform of the justice and home affairs sectors had not been moved for debate in the House even though it was presented last November. And yet, Labour’s motion, presented in December, was now before the House. This, Dr Debono said, was just one instance of psychological evidence against him.
Nationalist MPs had complained of suffering under labour, he said. He, a Nationalist, was suffering under the Nationalists and had a police guard outside his home.
Dr Debono said that if the minister wanted to take the credit for reducing pending court cases through the new debt recovery mechanism introduced in 2004, when he was parliamentary secretary, he should also carry the burden of responsibility for the extension to the law courts builting in the heart of Valletta, which had to be dismantled. On that alone the minister should have resigned.
He should have assumed responsibility for people who died in prison or under arrest, drug trafficking in the police lock-up, and drug trafficking by a prison warder in prison
The minister should shoulder responsibility for people killed by the police because they were not given taser guns quickly enough.
Dr Debono hit out in particular against the way how, he said, Dr Mifsud Bonnici had ‘conspired’ with the Opposition to delay the introduction of the mechanism of legal assistance to persons under arrest.
In so doing, he said, the minister had denied a fundamental right, something which flew in the face of what the Nationalist Party stood for. His decision had led to a situation where the courts were now rejecting statements given to the police by people under interrogation, and one case after another was collapsing in court.
The PN’s strategy, Dr Debono said, was to try to put off, as far as possible whatever he proposed, in an attempt to keep him in abeyance. The same had happened to his motions on party funding and the electoral law. He was being told now that his motions would be moved. But as far as he was concerned, the government could do what it wished, he had done his duty and found no acknowledgement for it.
Indeed, this was the problem. Some people, including some ministers, failed repeatedly and were given new life after life. Others came up with good ideas which were killed off.
He had presented many ideas and he was not guilty of ministerial mismanagement, yet it was his resignation from the House that the PN had demanded. And no one considered his family.
Now the PN was claiming it wanted ideas and was coming up with many so-called initiatives to listen to the people. But people should beware. When ideas went wrong, they would be blamed. When they went right, other people would take the credit.
Dr Debono said that Dr Mifsud Bonnici had, on being pressured, presented a motion for reforms, but this was a confusing mis-mesh presented in a panic without consulting anyone. There was confusion within it about the roles of magistrates, and there had been widespread criticism about the minister’s proposals on trade union rights for the police.
Indeed, Dr Debono said, under Mifsud Bonnici’s stewardship, the police force was lacking strategic direction and there was an exodus of policemen. Those were the people whom the prime minister should be trying to persuade to stay, not the minister.
Dr Debono observed that claims had been made that the censure motion was an act of vindictiveness and a move to destroy the minister and his family. There had been no such qualms in the actions taken against John Dalli.
But had the President of Malta and the Chief Justice been vindictive when they also noted shortcomings? The President had noted mistakes in charge sheets and said people should be held responsible. The Chief Justice had said not enough importance was being given to justice, a massive indictment against the minister. Was that psychological violence too? The Chief Justice used to work int he same law office as the minister's father. Surely he could not be vindictive?
Even the Director of the Criminal Court, Joe Sacco, said yesterday that everything in the law courts was going down. He was very prophetic because even a chair had collapsed when he leaned against it in court, Dr Debono said, half jokingly.
Dr Debono repeatedly touched on points he had made in his November motion. Malta, he said, still had a situation where police inspectors were both investigators and prosecutors and magistrates had both the role of inquiring magistrates and also sat in judgement.
It was disgraceful, Dr Debono said, that Dr Mifsud Bonnici was made Leader of the House when a censure motion was pending against him. There was no doubt, he said, that the members of the backbench wanted to be ministers, there was nothing wrong with that. The problem was that members of the front bench were clinging to their seats and did not want to move to the back.
The minister, he said, was slow in taking action on many fronts. Some said he was a patient man. But what the country needed was hard work. The minister was praised for enacting new fireworks regulations. But how many people died before the patient minister acted?
As for the drugs situation in prison, Josette Bickle (convicted for drug trafficking behind bars) was a sacrificial lamp to a system which should have been remedied a long time ago.
The number of prison searches for drugs in the first five months of this year already exceeded all of last year’s total. So why were only so few searches made last year?
The Nationalist MP hit out at the government several times over its failure to enact a party funding law.
He also defended his own academic achievements, saying that last November he had even been praised as a ‘star student’ by ‘Daphne Cachia Caruana’ when she compared him to Gordon Pisani, the prime minister’s PRO and his former classmate.
In saying that he disagreed with almost everything that Dr Mifsud Bonnici had done, Dr Debono pointed out how he had, from the backbench, today presented a whole Code of Administrative Law, something which should have been done a long time ago.
Dr Debono also criticised the minister for not reforming the institute of legal aid, the method of appointment of judges and their retirement age. He said there was a ‘Babylon’ in the way the court experts system functioned. The mediation system needed to be revisited and the system or mandatory arbitration had to be changed.
Dr Debono concluded his speech at 10 p.m., having been granted a 20-minute extension, which he exceeded slightly.
The debate continues tomorrow morning and ends with the vote at 7.30 p.m.