The faint hope that Parliament would instruct the prime minister to order an independent inquiry into the findings and allegations of impropriety and corruption committed by people in public office was very quickly crushed by a government majority that continues to protect the Panama Gang from any investigation into their crimes.
In place of Chris Said’s motion to set up an independent inquiry by 3 judges chosen by cross-party consensus to investigate allegations by Daphne Caruana Galizia, Labour is proposing an alternative motion proposing nothing of the sort and instead a standing ovation to praise the greatness of the government.
The Labour party’s amendment to replace Chris Said’s proposal is a piece of Soviet self-praise. After the European Parliament practically unanimously called for the restoration of the rule of law in Malta, the Maltese Parliament is today celebrating the sublime perfection, the divine blessing, the unblemished incorruptibility of our great government and the smooth workings of the institutions of the land.
Effectively the Maltese Parliament, when tonight it approves Labour’s motion presented to replace Chris Said, will divert the focus away from Daphne Caruana Galizia’s life and work and on to their favourite moment of her existence: her death and silence. And in congratulating and celebrating the perfect completion of the investigation into her death they implicitly rule out the obvious: that someone ordered this and we don’t quite know who that someone is yet.
Someone ordered this. Almost certainly someone in the long list of people Chris Said proposed should be subjected to an independent investigation.
Someone ordered this. Quite possibly someone in Parliament today voting for the motion celebrating the limpid infallibility of government.
As with the prime minister’s personal actions in court to suppress investigations into the findings of the Panama Papers, the prime minister today makes Parliament suppress investigation into the allegations of Daphne Caruana Galizia.
This is the way they can keep saying ‘but none of Daphne’s allegations have been proven in court’. Of course. If you do everything to prevent them from even being properly investigated, how can they ever be proven in court?
Malta’s Labour party was unable to influence in any way the outcome of the vote in the European Parliament. But it is obviously perfectly able to force the Maltese Parliament to its knees and give the government a blowjob.
May the Opposition fight the good fight today.