I am afraid I must do a lot of repeating this week for the simple reason that a lot needs repeating; both what I have written about myself in past weeks and what has been written by others. And the first topic is the proposed project for Balluta Square and surrounds.

Since my article entitled Hands Off Balluta! of two weeks ago, I was (shall we say "nearly", to avoid dramatising) overwhelmed by the response from all quarters, invariably against such a project. There have been constant letters and commentaries both before and after. The Prime Minister, in reply to a parliamentary question by Robert Arrigo, played down the project to that of "an electric bus". I am informed that the St Julians mayor has accepted to have some sort of consultation meeting by the end of the month and that the newly-formed Balluta Residents Association, led by people I know well and have met, has enrolled thousands of members. So, I urge the St Julians local council to give up the whole idea. Not one single person from the sources I read has written in favour of it. Stop wasting your and our time and let Balluta continue to breath.

On to University matters. I will declare at the outset that I have not managed to get a copy of Realtà yet. So, obviously, I have not read the contentious contents. But I will still say one thing to all the authorities concerned: Do not suppress students or student bodies unnecessarily. And then for the police to be involved! I suspect that there may have been an overreaction.

Campus is another important breathing space (like Balluta). It is the epitome of freedom of expression. It is the arena for the development of ideas, particularly radical and sometimes shocking ideas. What fun! This incident brought back some fond memories. As a University student for no less than 10 years, I experienced probably the best years of my life, notwithstanding no stipends, no transport except for the bus service, which would go nowhere near campus, but would stop at Msida (near the Arcidiacono showroom) and then a 15-minute walk, come rain or shine, and some very difficult and violent times. But I don't feel like talking about politics today. The two or three small car parks then in existence were hardly ever full; although we must acknowledge that the some 800 students in my time are now times 10.

I also served as editor and chairman successively of the student publications It-Toga and L-Istudent (I forget in what order but I still have lots of copies somewhere). Among my colleagues I had some future eminent personalities, such as media expert Fr Joe Borg, later Minister Michael Frendo and Gozitan lawyer Alfred Grech, besides loads of helpers. It was no mean job to get these publications out.

If I remember rightly, L-Istudent was actually printed at Lux Press (of The Bulletin fame) but It-Toga, for those of you who remember the "technology", was produced and printed by means of stencils, which were large pervious paper sheets which would be put onto a sort of roller machine, filled with ink, and then printed on paper. Any mistake had to be deleted by liquid Tipex and then typed over with the old Remington typewriter. We often went late into the night to "put the paper to bed", as is the journalistic jargon I learnt from my father, in order to meet our publication deadline. I am writing all this to promote student publications and encourage their publishers to keep going and to use the freedom of expression to which they have a right to the full (obviously within the limits of the law).

And now for the Crucifixes. There has been a debate in the papers about the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights regarding Crucifixes in Italian schools and the possible application of this judgment to Malta. I think it will suffice to state that the Constitution of Malta states categorically that the religion of Malta is the Roman Catholic Apostolic Religion. Also that the Roman Catholic Apostolic Religious authorities have the duty and the right to teach which principles are good and which are bad. And that the teaching of the Roman Catholic Apostolic Religion must be provided in all state schools as part of obligatory education. Need one say more?