As of the time of writing, Minister Manwel Mallia had not denied, at least in any form discernible by human eyes or ears, the story that broke on Sunday that he had threatened to resign if any residency qualification was introduced into the Passport for Cash Scheme his Great Leader had conceived.

 

This leads to a few interesting questions.

 

Firstly, why was the dear chap so eager not to have a residency qualification introduced, so much so that he was ready to put his Ministerial career on the line?  

 

I know it can't be the case, but anyone would think he was so beholden to someone who wanted to buy a spiffing Maltese passport that he'd make the ultimate sacrifice.  Obviously, this is not the case, so maybe it was just the usual bravado that lawyers who practise at the Criminal Bar see fit to deploy, with the small snag that this time around, there wasn't a jury to impress, just a finicky lawyer taking notes, and this without even eavesdropping to do it.

 

Secondly, given that he hasn't resigned, at least yet, why is this the case?  

 

Again, it can't be the case that Minister Mallia's word is worth the sum total of nothing, no-one with a spine could threaten to resign if something happens and then simply not reason when it does.

 

Thirdly, given that Mallia has a) not denied the resignation threat and b) not resigned, are we to understand that he does not see it that a residency qualification has actually (rather than virtually) been introduced?  

 

I mean, if X = Y where Y is resignation and X is the residency requirment, if Y didn't take place, it must mean that X didn't either.

 

Fourthly, if the hypothesis advanced in thirdly above is correct, namely that a very senior Cabinet Minister does not see it that a residency requirement has been introduced, at least to the extent that he has to keep his word, where does that leave a) his boss and b) the European Commission?   

 

The former seems to think that he's got the latter to agree to his cunning plan because a residency requirement has been tacked on, and the latter seems to think this is the case too, because they're allowing Joseph Muscat to put a sticker on his little package saying "as approved by the European Commission".

 

It would seem that Minister Mallia has rather blown the gaff on Muscat's little shimmy around the Commission, hasn't he?   

 

If you examine Muscat's words when he smirked his way through the Press Conference during which he announced "Peace in Our Time" with the Commission, it's by no means clear that this residency thing is anything but a pretty nifty bit of prestidigitation, one onto which the Commission seized with alacrity, thereby allowing them to avoid having to have a tedious tussle with Malta.

 

Down at the bottom-line, which is where we're militating now that it's become our Government's mission to sell our citizenship, it's a question of forking over about a million euro, taking up residence in an undefined manner and for an undefined period of time, making a couple of easy investments and getting yourself an address.

 

What's changed, then?   Not much that I can see, and precisely why the European Commission fell for it, apart from their not wanting to waste their time bickering with our PM, is not entirely clear.  

 

What is clear is that the slickness with which Muscat manouvered has allowed his Little Weasels to get all uppity and tell the rest of us, who can see through this sort of thing, to shut up now, because the European Commission is OK with it.

 

Amusingly, they forget how they rather wanted said EC to go away and smell the coffee just a few short weeks ago.