The choice of Karmenu Vella to head the environment portfolio in Brussels is a show of trust in Malta, according to Prime Minister Joseph Muscat.
Playing down concerns over what environmentalists feel is the irony of awarding the environment portfolio to a Maltese commissioner, Dr Muscat yesterday insisted Mr Vella would do a good job.
Dr Muscat was speaking at the Labour Party club in Paola when he gave his first reaction to Mr Vella’s nomination as commissioner-designate responsible for the environment, maritime affairs and fisheries. Acknowledging that Mr Vella would have to uphold the EU’s interests, Dr Muscat said President-designate Jean-Claude Juncker’s choice showed trust in the country. He hinted that, despite the Opposition leader’s public declaration that Nationalist Party MEPs would vote for Mr Vella, they were conducting “a whispering campaign” to put spokes in the wheels. Dr Muscat did not elaborate.
“We are not expecting any favours from anyone but people will compare how the Labour Party had supported [then PN foreign minister] Tonio Borg ahead of the grilling at the hands of MEPs and how today’s Opposition is acting,” he said.
Opposition leader Simon Busuttil last week said PN MEPs will vote for Mr Vella – only one vote will be held to approve the commission as a whole – but stopped short of saying whether they would lobby for his nomination.
The PN expressed “surprise” at what it described as the Prime Minister’s negative reaction.
“Rather than welcoming the Nationalist Party’s public statement of support for Karmenu Vella, the Prime Minister is casting doubt on it. Surely this is not a good way to rally national unity,” the PN said.
Mr Vella’s portfolio is the largest any Maltese commissioner has been entrusted with and came as a surprise to many. Green groups have expressed concern with the move to rope in the environment with other portfolios, which they believe will weaken the sector.
I am convinced Karmenu Vella will make a success of the post
But Dr Muscat did not see the irony of handing the environment portfolio to a country with significant challenges in the field. “We always had our problems in this and other sectors but we had our ways of proving ourselves and I am convinced Karmenu Vella will, as he did in every other portfolio he held, be realistic and make a success [of the post]... pushing forward EU policies in a sensible way,” Dr Muscat said.
Meanwhile, newly elected Labour MEP Miriam Dalli, who is Mr Vella’s daughter-in-law, yesterday told this newspaper she will not participate in the questioning of Mr Vella by the European Parliament.
She sits on the parliament’s environment committee that is expected to take a lead role in questioning Mr Vella when commissioner-designates face MEPs at the end of the month.
“I informed the coordinator of the Socialists and Democrats [the political group she forms part of] and the president of the environment committee that I will be present but not participate because it will be unethical for me to do so,” she said.