Simon Busuttil said a few days ago he was willing to go “wherever necessary” to clear Malta’s name if elected to lead the country on June 3.
Joseph Muscat was quick to react: if the Opposition leader wants his country’s name from being tarnished all he had to do is go to Bidnija (where blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia resides).
Both are wrong.
If elected to power, Dr Busuttil should spend as much time as he can on the island to put everything together again, right the wrongs and ensure justice is done with all those who were in a position to see that truth prevailed but instead preferred to turn a Nelson’s eye.
Dr Muscat need not go far either: just look outside his office at Castille and, indeed, closer at the mirror when shaving.
The sorry state this country is in is only thanks to his inability/unwillingness to take the bull by the horns when the first signs of gross misconduct emerged. It started with denials, moved to a stage of what-is-wrong-in-having-a-secret-company to the present situation of catch me if you can.
What two eminent legal experts had to say about accountability and transparency deserve repetition.
In an article on this newspaper headed ‘When ministers sin’, Kevin Aquilina, dean of the Faculty of Laws at the University of Malta, wrote thus on January 4, 2013: “It does sometimes happen that ministers responsible for maladministration, rather than taking the honourable decision to step down, instead find solace in the doctrine of ministerial responsibility once they know that if they have erred, even if grossly, fellow ministers and MPs hailing from their own political party have no other political option but to bail them out in Parliament.”
He proposed the matter should not be left on a political level but be given a legal form and suggested the enactment of a law setting out six levels of ministerial accountability: (1) redirecting the question to the relevant minister; (2) providing all relevant information; (3) providing full explanations; (4) taking remedial action; (5) accepting personal culpability or (6) resignation.
“When ministers or people in authority remain silent speculation thrives. At times, it is very convenient to hide behind secrecy and confidential provisions in Maltese law without taking the necessary steps to amend or repeal, or suggest the repeal or amendment, in certain circumstances, of such provisions,” he noted.
Raymond Mangion, head of the Department of Legal History and Methodology at the University of Malta’s Faculty of Laws, wrote about ministerial transparency and accountability on this newspaper late last month: “‘Individual responsibility’ – the Constitution does not mention ‘liability’ – of any representative of the people at the helm of a portfolio should be rendered efficacious by the incorporation of a mechanism that would ipso facto suspend the elected member of the government concerned in case he prima facie breaches an express list of criteria. Our judicature did repeatedly determine that, under administrative law, one is to answer for one’s own misbehaviour.”
The message the two experts convey is all too clear. We can kill the time until what they propose happens by chanting Psalm 26 of David, particularly line 10, which speaks of those “in whose hands are wicked schemes, whose right hands are full of bribes”.