I just came from a long walk in the countryside – or what’s left of it once you weave around all the ‘Private Keep Out’ signs – with the daughter and the dog. We were rather pasty (not the dog) and chubby (the dog) from being stuck inside for many days with the flu (not the dog) and the weather (the dog).

“With each book I get, each weed I pull out and each drawing I sketch, I get a flicker of a feeling that maybe, someday, all will be well with the world.”

I also needed to get off the grid, as I am increasingly finding myself talking to, and swearing at gadgets whenever a fresh insane news flash comes in. After four hours of walking in Mtaħleb – so beautiful – we came back and then the three of us flopped on the carpet feeling totally zenified (me), with colours in the cheeks (the daughter) and weighing approximately 10 grams less (the dog).

It was good while it lasted; I then had to get back to my laptop to write this column, which meant refreshing the news update and reading about:

How a top government minister, Konrad Mizzi, the one who has a secret account in Panama, gave €130,000 of taxpayers’ money in direct orders to Nexia BT, the company which had conveniently set up the Panama account for him. But maybe, just maybe, it is all coincidental because after all Mizzi had told us that he only has €92 in this secret account even though he was advised to open it so that he could “populate his assets”.

How a private legal firm in the UK, Bird and Bird, was commissioned by the Malta government to reply to the damning MEP report about the rule of law in Malta, and the report, surprise, surprise, declared that all is well in the state of Denmark. This report cost us taxpayers €26,000 – money with which the government could have, say, employed a nurse for a year at the desperately short-staffed Mount Carmel hospital. In their report Bird and Bird refer to the police investigation on the Daphne Caruana Galizia assassination in the past tense. Aha. So the Police Commissioner informed the UK Birds but not the Maltese citizens. When will we be told the outcome? Or do we need to commission another report for that?

Were this a normal country, people in government would have resigned and the rule of law would be upheld

How in Slovakia, the Culture Minister, the Chief State Adviser and the Chairman of Slovakia’s Security Council resigned following the double murder of a journalist – Jan Kuciak and his girlfriend – who had been investigating allegations of corruption linked to allies of the Slovak Prime Minister. The Slovak Culture Minister said: “I cannot as Culture Minister put up with a journalist being murdered during my tenure.” And when I read it, I thought: this is what happens in normal countries – people in responsible positions feel mortified that something so atrocious as the killing of a journalist happened under their watch and feel they have to take responsibility. Instead, over here the Prime Minister speaks of “accountability” not “responsibility” because it’s easier to detach with a word that smacks of numbers. And he tells us that it’s up to the courts to bring to justice the three ‘unemployed’ people who carried out the brutal act, conveniently bypassing the fact that unless the person who COMMISSIONED the assassination is brought to justice, then, no one is ever going to be “accountable”.

And so, here I am now, writing this, my zen gone, my anger festering. Were this a normal country, people in government would have resigned, the rule of law would be upheld, the same party would still be in government but it would be a cleaner one rid of the corrupt rot, and we would all breathe a sigh of relief that democracy is alive and healthy in our country. And would be writing about the herbs I’m growing in the garden, the dog’s diet and the other silly things that make life go round.

But I cannot – because this is not a normal country and the basics of decency and integrity are not adhered to. People in power show no sense of respect to the citizens who elect them. Just because a corrupt government was voted in, it does not mean that we stop fighting corruption itself.

If you are feeling as hopeless and helpless as I am, please tell me how you manage to take a deep breath and keep your cool. I have been going for long walks where I leave the foot print marks on the tarmac; I’m pottering in the gardening and get out my anger on weeds and those black snails; I bought a set of water colours and doodle the helplessness out; I am re-reading Harry Potter because the main characters make me feel good and I can count on them; I’ve become a sucker for magazines of art and beautiful things; and I’ve become a book stalker at Agenda bookshops and Bookdepository, buying books and piling them up on my bedside table. With each book I get, each weed I pull out and each drawing I sketch, I get a flicker of a feeling that maybe, someday, all will be well with the world.

If only.

krischetcuti@gmail.com
Twitter: @krischetcuti