Justice Minister Owen Bonnici tried hard to defend his government and failed miserably. Whether he chose to be there or was forced by his Prime Minister, that’s none of my business, and frankly I don’t care.
What concerns me is that we had a senior government minister trying, unsuccessfully, to play down the desperate rule of law situation in Malta, and in the process he made things worse – and a fool of himself. For no one at the Civil Liberties Committee of the European Parliament believed him.
Bonnici tailed off his measly defence of the government by saying that “there is consensus between the Prime Minister and the Opposition leader that there is no serious risk of rule of law or the deterioration of European values in Malta”.
He lied, or to put it mildly, was ‘misled’ by his speechwriter.
For Adrian Delia, and Simon Busuttil before him, have repeatedly expressed their grave concern about the rule of law in Malta and the deterioration of European values. The Nationalist Party based its entire electoral campaign on corruption and the lack of good governance. And Delia has repeatedly, in Parliament and beyond, expressed his concern about the collapse of the country’s institutions.
It is shameful that Malta has become the frequent subject of scrutiny in the European Parliament. And that started before the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. But it was Daphne’s death which highlighted the serious situation in Malta. The government could have saved Malta’s face by firing the incompetent Police Commissioner, who refused to take action following a damming FIAU report which implicated a senior government minister in grave allegations of corruption and kickbacks. But the government would have none of that. The Prime Minister continued to ride roughshod, behaving as if Malta was his backyard.
The Vitals deal – which saw three State hospitals given to a company whose owners remain, to date, unknown, and which is costing us taxpayers nearly €200,000 daily – was next.
Despite vociferous criticism from the Opposition and demands from the Malta Medical Association for the government to come clean and put all cards on the table, the Prime Minister refused to bow to the justified pressure and do what was right: halt the agreement between Vitals and the new American company set to take ownership of the hospitals until the Auditor General concludes his investigations on the Vitals deal.
Owen Bonnici tried hard to defend his government and failed miserably
No wonder that in Brussels we are the talk of town – for the wrong reasons. Unfortunately, the price we’re paying might, sooner rather than later, cost us jobs and money. For amid the collapse of the rule of law in Malta and the confusion that that brings about, a handful of foreign MEPs are doing their best to erode our tax system and the financial incentives that enable us to attract foreign investment.
Time and again, MEPs, mostly German and French, have sought to portray a dark, unjustified, off-the-mark picture of Malta’s financial services industry, depicting Malta as the backyard for money laundering and shady financial dealings.
At the European Parliament, Bonnici said that criticism levelled against Malta “does not reflect the real Malta”. What Bonnici fails to realise, or he does but cannot bring himself to admit it, is that the criticism, save for the handful of foreign MEPs who want to use our sorry state to their advantage, is not levelled at the people of Malta but at his government. For it is the Maltese government, of which Bonnici is a senior minister, that is giving Malta and the Maltese a bad name.
The collapse of the State institutions that are meant to protect us, the bleak situation of the rule of law in Malta and the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia are not the people’s fault. They are the result of the ‘anything goes’ culture which has been allowed to flourish from the first day that Labour was returned to power in 2013 after two decades in the wilderness.
But instead of using its time to bring a change for the better when returned to power, Labour and its bedfellows returned with a lust for power and a ‘get rich quick’ mentality. Today, it’s wreaking havoc.
For while the economy is doing well in many sectors, there is no long-term planning. No new economic sectors are being created. Short-term measures, the passport scheme and the construction industry have been deployed, which in the long term cannot be sustained.
And to make matters worse, the rule of law has been discarded and criminals are allowed to act with impunity.
In the meantime, industrial relations disputes are rife, with students and teachers at Mcast, as with employees at Air Malta, Enemalta, the Foundation for Welfare Services, Wasteserv and the government pharmacists. Repeated calls for the government to pull up its socks and stop this rot have gone unheeded. Sadly, it’s law abiding citizens who bear the brunt.
Frank Psaila is a lawyer and anchors Iswed fuq l-Abjad on NET TV.