Judge Giovanni Bonello has stated that the major flaw of our Constitution lies in the fact that it was written by gentlemen for the use of gentlemen, but instead it has ended up being abused by scoundrels.

Whether one agrees with the gentlemen part or not, it has certainly been hijacked by scoundrels.

Scoundrels with hidden companies or accounts in Panama or Jersey, lawmakers who end up enacting laws tailor-made to serve nominee companies, żviluppaturi (developers) and/or business interests they collaborate with, scoundrels who believe they can get away with the despicable smirk they eternally wear on their faces.

It has taken another human sacrifice, Daphne Caruana Galizia’s, to all of a sudden resuscitate talk about a constitutional convention.

Six years ago, then Opposition leader Joseph Muscat waxed lyrical about constitutional reform and the Second Republic.  Once elected, he took us all for a ride.

He appointed Franco Debono as co-ordinator for constitutional reform, well foreseeing that the Nationalists would never accept working under Debono’s presidency. The short-sighted Nationalists allowed themselves to be manipulated by Muscat’s cunning scheming and immediately swallowed the Prime Minister’s bait.

Instead, they could have called Muscat’s bluff by accepting to participate and then forge alliances with other parties, NGOs and civil society organisations to obtain a winning majority within the convention on various issues.

The reality is that the PN was not really interested in real reform. Its one and only real interest just echoed Muscat’s and the Labour Party’s: that of getting into the seat of power and reaping the full fruits for itself and its party aficionados.

We need a real constitutional convention, presided over by a qualified, independent-minded person, wherein the prime protagonist is Maltese civil society

Daphne’s human sacrifice must not be in vain, as Karen Grech or Raymond Caruana’s were.

Remember December 1986? Raymond Caruana was brutally assassinated, and the MLP and the PN were forced to kick-start constitutional amendments.

Result? Thirty years of piecemeal meddling with our Constitution, the sole, self-serving aim being the reinforcement of the two parties’ bipolar hold on everything in this country.

A second result? The institutional and ethical mess in which this country now finds itself.

A third result? Raymond and Karin’s killers unknown until today.

Fast forward to October 2017. Daphne is clinically assassinated by a cold-blooded mind and hand that certainly do not seem to be touched by human sentiments. This cold-bloodedness is certainly typical of callous Mafiosi. Yet we are not sure whether these Mafiosi are imported ‘pedigree’ ones or actually home-bred, soulless persons.

While the original Semtex theory might have pointed towards the former, the now prevailing TNT theory –  ġelatina being easily available in Malta – would redirect our finger towards the latter.

Whatever the case, Daphne’s human sacrifice cannot and must not be in vain. Certain crocodile tears that have been shed over the past few weeks were shameless.  Silence in parliamentary debates would have been more fitting for certain parliamentarians. Promoting Daphne to the status of “journalist” after her brutal assassination following a lifetime of describing her in a denigratory tone as a “blogger”, sometimes qualified by “biċċa” (irrelevant), is a bit too little, too late.

If the two till now dominant political parties intend to give us a repeat of the post-Raymond piecemeal constitutional amendments, they might as well forget it. We are not interested in having them dictate the constitutional agenda. We are not interested in the PN fixation of just kicking out the Police Commissioner or the Attorney General as a momentary, stopgap measure to the serious institutional and ethical deficit the country is suffering from.

What we need is a real constitutional convention, presided over by a qualified, independent-minded person, wherein the prime protagonist is Maltese civil society (the authentic one, free from those politicians hiding behind this nomenclature) that works together with the political parties and other actors to ensure that we Maltese get the clean, transparent, pluralistic and democratic institutions that we deserve.

A constitution that sweeps away the ‘greedy money’ mentality that is prevailing in this country.

A constitution that truly reflects those ‘healthy’ observations on ethics in Maltese life that Daphne so passionately used to stress.

Arnold Cassola is former chairmanof Alternattiva Demokratika.

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