The Labour Party used to lambast Eddie Fenech Adami and his Cabinet ministers, back in the day, when they used to adopt a ‘get up and go’ attitude towards the governance of the country.

This was in the aftermath of the 1980s kitchen-economy style of financial administration adopted by Dom Mintoff and his side-kicks, when the best we could get was the best because it was free (that is to say, a donation of surplus rubbish) and a reflection of the depths to which our self-confidence has plummeted.

Today, clearly, money is no problem for Mintoff’s successor but two (although perhaps they are closer in philosophy).

For how else could you justify the purchase, by its owner, from the operators of the Cafe Premier, of the premises?

OK, fine, what was paid is the market price for the property but, as the National Audit Office pointed out, the whole process left much to be desired, which is an understatement of cosmic Anglo-Saxon proportions.

Luckily, the Prime Minister, who can’t say he didn’t know this was happening, has an Anglo-Saxon sense of humour, he says, and, therefore, he might wish to share the joke with us.

The market price was paid for the property but the whole process left much to be desired

The joke is on us, however, the people who, amnesties and tax-evasions apart, supply Joseph Muscat with the cash he needs to ‘buy’ places like the Premier.

What was paid, it seems, is quite a few million (what’s a few million between friends?).

Maybe Ninu Zammit can answer that) for the operators to get out of the premises, an issue that was the subject of a court case instituted by the owner of the property (the government) to get them slung out for not abiding by the obligations of their lease.

Forgive me for raising an eyebrow but since when is it a fair market, arm’s length, transaction to fork out millions in order to do what you’re asking the court to order the people receiving the dosh to do?

Am I missing something, in which case the comments on the electronic version of these words of wisdom will, no doubt, let me know in glaring detail?

Now, if the transaction had been limited to transferring cash from one of the government’s many pockets to another, such as tax liability, then perhaps one could have seen the sense of it, especially if in practical terms there would have been no hope of getting the money otherwise.

The thing is, it’s not only these liabilities that were settled but, from what seems to be the case, quite a few others, not government ones, either, including quite a hefty chunk of what the NAO described as a commission, or broker’s fee.

Nice work if you can get it, frankly, and it’s good to know that the government is so business-friendly that it will jump at the chance to bail out commercial enterprises that go belly up.

I imagine quite a few sets of creditors would like it, with or without a commission payable, if Muscat were to be so kind as to charge up on his white horse to save them too.

That we have a business-friendly government is hardly a matter of dispute, clearly.

For instance, it’s probably encouraging for members of the mercantile fraternity to know that they can sidle up to some functionary or other and negotiate a deal whereby their stashed loot, the stuff they have in not-so-secret Swiss bank accounts (or Liechtenstein, or Bermuda, or Kitts & St Nevis or wherever, who cares?) can be ‘repatriated’ after the tiresome formality of paying some tax on it is endured.

It’s nice to know, were you to be someone experiencing this sort of problem (I don’t, to be sure), that under Muscat’s watch, it’s a sympathetic ear that you will be getting, indeed a couple of tweets of support from the great man himself.

Not only that, but the previous government, from whom you hid all your not-very-well lit dealings, will also get the blame for not knowing what you were up to, shock horror.

Seriously, it’s ludicrous that sections of the media, not unknown for their odious hatred of anything Gonzi, blame Lawrence Gonzi’s government because the very people from whom he should have expected loyalty and honesty dispensed with their obligation to honour this expectation.

Instead of asking precisely why someone like Zammit was allowed to benefit from (yet another) amnesty after having failed to do that little thing over the many, many years when it was assumed that his declarations of assets were truthful and accurate, these valiant knights of the media whine about the fact that Gonzi failed to see what was happening.

Looking beyond our shores for a change, what price truth and probity within FIFA under the venerable, but not venerated, Sepp Blatter?

Under this man’s stewardship, Qatar was awarded the World Cup in whenever it is going to be held there. It took these geniuses up to now to figure out that, duh, it’s searing hot in Qatar in summer and football is not an option. Walking outside, unless you’re a camel, and a particularly loony one (or an Englishman, in the words of the old song) at that, is hardly an option.

So, in order for Blatter and his cronies not to lose face, the idea seems to be that the World Cup will be held in winter, messing up innumerable football leagues and turning the whole thing into pretty much a farce. Ironically, some people are saying that this might actually be to England’s advantage because they won’t be turning up to play with a set of players who are knackered after a full English season.

This is not an argument to which I give any credence, of course, because England’s main problem is that its players are a bunch of overpaid twerps who don’t see any point in breaking into a sweat to win the World Cup.

The solution, of course, is simple: the associations that do not form part of Blatter’s smarmy clique should simply refuse to take part. At least that way, England will be saved the ignominy of having ‘back home, tra la la’ sung at them yet again.

And so to the end, with a recommendation for you that doesn’t involve schlepping up to Gozo. If you get a hankering after an Indian, which we did last Monday, you could do worse than try out Maharajah in Gżira, near Maxim’s and Chez Philippe.

You need to book, though, because it’s not an enormous place and even on Monday it was crowded, and with good reason

imbocca@gmail.com

www.timesofmalta.com/blogs

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