Following Daphne Caruana Galizia’s barbaric assassination, the Civil Society Network (CSN) entered its third week of protests, requesting the immediate removal of the Police Commissioner and Attorney General, and for their replacements to be subject to a two-thirds parliamentary majority vote.
CSN is equally insisting on proper constitutional reform.
The CSN has also stressed that its demands are non-partisan. This claim has been met with scepticism, since the requirement for a two-thirds parliamentary majority for the highest appointments of State was featured in the Nationalist Party’s 2017 electoral programme.
This is compounded by the fact that despite campaigning heavily against corruption during the preceding months on its own steam, the Nationalist Party is now seen to be jumping on the bandwagon of the CSN.
Inevitably, the above factors led to a number of observers concluding that the CSN’s initiative is targeted at undermining the government. Henceforth, social media wars ensued.
In the midst of all this frenzy, the rationale underpinning the CSN’s demands was lost in translation. The most crucial matter one should consider, beyond partisan politics, is: are these demands justified?
As far as the request for the removal of the Police Commissioner and Attorney General is concerned, arguments have been brought forward on the procedure laid down by law, which must be followed.
Any reforms to the Constitution will benefit Malta and not political parties
The practicality of the proposal for State appointments to be subject to a two-thirds parliamentary majority – as opposed to appointments by or on the advice of the Prime Minister – is also being questioned.
Rather than focus on legal procedure, I would prefer to scrutinise the message being communicated by the CSN. This centres around the current status of the rule of law in Malta.
The fundamental aspect of the rule of law is that no one is above the law and that the law is always applied, that is, the law cannot apply in certain circumstances but not in others.
Judge Giovanni Bonello recently said that Malta’s Constitution was “written by gentlemen for gentlemen”.
This echoes earlier calls by Chief Justice Silvio Camilleri for the rule of law to be safeguarded and for the law to be enforced “without fear or favour” by the authorities empowered to do so, with reference to the police, the Attorney General and the courts.
Chief Justice Camilleri added that “every system ultimately depends on the persons entrusted with its functioning”.
The application of the rule of law during recent events leaves much to be desired. During the past few months, consequent to several leaked, but never contradicted, FIAU reports involving investigations on suspicion of money laundering by top officials of government, the Police Commissioner took no public action regarding the shortcomings identified by the FIAU.
This included the information exposed in the Panama Papers.
Doubts remain if this inaction was the result of advice sought from the Attorney General or given by him.
In view of this inaction, the previous leader of the Opposition, Simon Busuttil, put forward separate requests for magisterial inquiries, covering the subject matter of the FIAU’s investigations. Separately, the Prime Minister requested that a magisterial inquiry be conducted into the Egrant claims. These have all been accepted and are presently under way.
Considering the inaction of the Police Commissioner and the doubts raised against the Attorney General, on more than one occasion involving government officials, the CSN’s demands for the present mechanism to be improved are indeed valid. The demands go beyond partisan politics, since any reforms to the Constitution will benefit Malta and not political parties.
The rule of law does not exist to protect suspected dereliction of duty.
Erika Bajada is an accountant with a background in financial services regulation.