Robert Abela's performance at today's press conference about the coronavirus was abysmal. The content was thin, his answers to journalists snide, the case he made on his government's behalf shallow and strained. At one point he must have realised just how badly he was doing because he told his audience he was not feeling too [...]
In a statement this afternoon Repubblika referred to the hard-hitting letter that standards czar George Hyzler sent earlier today to Speaker Anġlu Farrugia. The exchange followed the suppression of George Hyzler's conclusions that Joseph Muscat acted unethically when his thugs detained journalists in Castille on 29 November 2019. "It's clear to us that the Speaker [...]
The video of Robert Abela announcing we’d all be running come March made the rounds before today’s inevitable announcement of restrictive measures to try to rein in the rates of contagion from the covid disease. Even the most ambivalent and terminally unconcerned gasped at daily rates of infection of over 300. Deaths are creeping up [...]
George Hyzler, Commissioner for Standards in Public Life, told Speaker Anġlu Farrugia he had no authority to dismiss the Commissioner’s report that found Joseph Muscat breached ethics when he locked journalists up in Castille in 2019. Commissioner Hyzler complained the Speaker never asked him what he thought about such a decision. “I would have expressed [...]
Time can bring you down Time can bend your knees Time can break your heart Have you begging, please. - Eric Clapton Once again Robert Abela took centre stage. He always does it when there are good tidings. Tuesday week he took credit for il-Koħħu’s admission to being one of those who executed Daphne [...]
My wife got a call this morning on her mobile phone number. The number was withheld. "No Caller ID". The person who spoke to her asked for Mrs Delia and said she was calling from Owen Bonnici's office. Did she know Owen Bonnici has an office in Żurrieq? Would she like to visit him there? [...]
Chris Fearne yesterday waxed melodramatic because the Opposition challenged him with allegations that political and clientelistic interference was allowing people to skip the line while waiting for covid vaccination. While denying this was happening Chris Fearne went into a rage telling the Opposition Leader, that a member of the PN parliamentary group asked him to [...]
Sitting through the President’s national unity conference on Saturday I detected in the interventions of some people – though by no means in all – a recognition that Malta has reached extremes of divisiveness we all must make a conscious effort to crawl back from. Probably in a diplomatic effort to avoid disputes on interpretation [...]
This set of photos is by Jon Borg.
Mario Cutajar responded to a speech Jason Azzopardi gave in Parliament yesterday where the MP alleged collusion between the civil service chief an the guy who headed the police force around 2013 to intimidate a senior civil servant into resigning. Cutajar's statement is 8 paragraphs long. Seven and a half paragraphs do not address the [...]
There’s something disturbing in the government’s attitude to the pandemic. Unless you own a bar or operate a club that depends on the rental of a bar, there are no material ‘restrictions’ to ordinary life in spite of ever-growing numbers of infected. The tourism industry is on its knees. But otherwise, life goes on as [...]
Repubblika, #occupyjustice and manueldelia.com notify that the protest announced for tomorrow Monday, 1 March 2021 at 5 pm in front of Parliament has been called after we notified the Police and in compliance with the requirements and guidelines from the health authorities. We ask anyone feeling unwell to stay at home. We remind all protesters [...]
In between Robert Abela’s macabre murmurings that the institutions are working, a phrase he’s repeated ad nauseum since he began his reign of continuity just over a year ago, let’s not sweep Nuxellina under the table in a brown paper bag. Just because she’s (conditionally) resigned as Parliamentary Secretary for Reforms (pending an investigation) doesn’t [...]
This morning's Sunday Times editorial sums up why people are angry at the government in the week the government felt entitled to the people's applause for developments in the Daphne Caruana Galizia case. "(Robert) Abela must stop repeating the mantra that the rule of law prevails and that the institutions are working. The rule of law [...]
From my article in The Sunday Times today: "That’s two state witnesses, relied upon by the prosecution to say the truth, pointing at Cardona. "You’d think they’re hard to ignore. "Is this 'judicial truth'? Perhaps not. However, we must be assured someone, somewhere is trying to find it. "It doesn’t help us believe that when [...]
I feature on cartoons on two Sunday newspapers today. On KullĦadd I make the leader of the nationalist party follow his predecessor on the plank. On Illum I bring Robert Abela to his knees. I feel I should be saying something smart now but I'm sorry, I have nothing.
Campaigners who want national policy to allow migrants to drown at sea and to officially discriminate against black people gathered in Valletta today in furtherance of their cause. All 3 of them. I am not going to indulge them by telling you what they said. You can imagine that, though you should have liked not [...]
The Government Gazette says today that Ian Abdilla, the senior police officer who sipped coffee while Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad whisked the evidence out of Pilatus Bank, is to get a medal for service to the nation. Daphne Caruana Galizia, killed in the line of duty, has not yet been recognised by the State, although [...]
Judge Edwina Grima confirmed on appeal a suspended prison sentence handed down by a lower court against two men who shoddily built a wall in a Swieqi property that collapsed over a 19-year-old man, killing him on the spot. Some weeks ago, this website recalled the story of Quentin Michel, a student killed in Malta [...]
