In my view, the words used by Magistrate Francesco Depasquale when delivering judgment inthe libel case instituted by Keith Schembri, the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, against a journalist of the Nationalist Party media must rank among the most damning ever addressed at a local journalist.

The magistrate said that the PN journalist’s story “causes much more harm than good to journalism and to the respect which the media deserve since the article is not based on truth and on facts but on the author’s intention to harm Keith Schembri who is deemed to be the political adversary of the Nationalist Party and to harm the government of the day”.

Anybody who daily follows the stories published in the PN’s newspapers knows that similar items, which are based more on the intention to “harm the government” at all costs rather than to inform readers of the truth, are a regular feature of the PN’s media. And, yet, we keep hearing Simon Busuttil preach about “honesty in politics”.

Once he allows this kind of gutter politics in his party’s media, the leader of the Opposition is not qualified to speak about honesty in politics at all.