Updated 9.45 p.m.
The Opposition will move a no confidence motion in Home Affairs Minister Manuel Mallia, Opposition leader Simon Busuttil said tonight.
He said that once the prime minister had not had the courage to dismiss the minister after last week's shooting incident involving his driver, the Opposition had to act.
Dr Busuttil noted that in his speech in Parliament this evening, the prime minister did not defend any of his MPs over their scandalous behaviour, other than Dr Mallia.
Yet it was Dr Mallia who the people were most angry about. What happened last week, including the government's reaction to it, was a clear case where the minister had to assume political responsibility.
In defending the minister, the prime minister was an accomplice, Dr Busuttil said. Ordering an inquiry was useless because inquiries did not say who should assume political responsibility. It was the prime minister who should assume his responsibilities, but he was increasingly showing that he was a hostage to Dr Mallia, and he had lost his moral authority.
Dr Busuttil said that the fact that the minister's driver had still not been arraigned further reinforced suspicion of a cover-up. It followed the way how a government statement did not carry the true version of events, the minister's car was moved before the magisterial inquiry was carried out, and then it was washed the next day.
If this was not a cover-up, he did not know what was, Dr Busuttil said.
Dr Mallia was the minister responsible to ensure that such things should not happen.
GOVERNMENT REACTION
In a reaction the Office of the Prime Minister said Dr Busuttil was playing a partisan game. He did not want to await the outcome of the inquiry into the case and wanted to be judge and jury.
MALLIA SAYS HE DID NOT WRITE, SEE STATEMENT BEFORE
IT WAS ISSUED
Earlier, Dr Mallia said in reply to parliamentary questions that he did not write or authorise the statement issued (by the government) on Wednesday about the shooting incident in which his driver was involved.
The statement raised a storm of controversy when it was wrongly claimed that the minister’s driver, Constable Paul Sheehan, had fired warning shots ‘in the air’ at a car which had earlier hit the minister’s car. It later resulted that the minister's driver shot had hit the car.
“I was not informed of the details of the statement, and I did not see the statement before it was issued,” Dr Mallia told Nationalist MPs Francis Zammit Dimech and Jason Azzopardi.
Dr Mallia said that at the time of the incident he was attending a dinner at police headquarters as guest of the Acting Commissioner along with a number of foreigners who were in Malta for a conference. It was there that he was informed of the incident. The initial information he was given by the commissioner was that his own car had been shot at. The Commissioner then got up to verify his information.
Dr Mallia said he was ‘in a panic’ at the time.
He said he never heard the Acting Commissioner tell anyone to move the car involved in the incident or put it on a low loader.
Earlier, the minister said that he, as minister could not be held responsible for abuse by whoever in the police force was assigned a firearm.
He said that as minister, he did not decide who was assigned firearms and could not be held responsible for abuse of those firearms.
Dr Mallia said last Wednesday's incident was regrettable. This was an incident which had personally hurt him. Investigations were continuing.
Dr Zammit Dimech noted that the minister in his press conference on Thursday morning had not expressed any disgust over the incident. He only did that on Thursday evening, after the prime minister did so.
Dr Mallia said he would not allow the Opposition to tarnish his integrity. At the press conference he had immediately corrected the statement and expressed his regret over the whole incident.
He could not understand how anyone could think otherwise when in the past he had battled abuse.
He had no doubt that the Opposition wanted his head on a plate, Dr Mallia said, but the Opposition should do so politically and with reasoned argument. He had nothing to do in this case and was certainly not involved in any cover-up. Had he felt himself to be responsible, he would have immediately resigned. Politics was not the be all of his life.
He intended to prove his integrity before the Board of Inquiry composed of three former judges.
Dr Mallia said he was never close to his driver, as had been wrongly claimed, and the first time he met him was when he was assigned to him as a driver.