The people the government calls biased asshole — or shit holes, depending on the mood — cannot objectively understand why the government refuses to open an independent inquiry into the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia.
Labour trolls repeat the mantra that three people are awaiting trial in connection to her murder. That’s more than Karin Grech’s or Raymond Caruana’s cases as if that is supposed to be some consolation.
But the government is actually preventing the facts from emerging.
That’s not what happens in the rest of the world in similar circumstances and the ‘biased assholes’ come from the rest of the world and know what is expected.
Consider the Strasbourg attacks just last week. President Emmanuel Macron assured the public that when the manhunt for Cherif Chekatt was over and he was shot down by the police on Thursday night the case was not considered closed. The police are investigated whether there were any accomplices.
But more to the point “French authorities are working to clarify why the suspect in the Strasbourg Christmas market attack was not stopped before he could act”.
That’s not something the police can investigate. Macron said yesterday that “France should draw from the consequences of any police failures and work on what could be improved”.
Because the duty of finding the perpetrator of a crime is paramount but kicks in when a greater duty fails: to prevent the crime altogether.
The State has fallen short of its responsibility to protect the lives of the victims of Cherif Chekatt and citizens have a right to know how that failure came about, what responsibilities need to be carried and how a repetition is prevented.
Perhaps these investigations conclude that nothing more could have been done and somehow there will always be gaps. But that’s not likely. And if all incidents are followed with this sense of collective resignation no effort is made to improve structures and procedures to prevent their repetition.
The Nationalist Party’s motion in Parliament asking the government to do what it should have ordered 14 months ago already failed because the MPs supporting the government blocked it. The government argued that there should first be a conclusion of the criminal process — which could take more than a decade — before an inquiry on lessons learnt is conducted.
Fr Joe Borg writing on The Sunday Times today criticised the Partit Demokratiku for “muddying the waters” on this issue. He was referring to the PD’s amendment to set up a Desmond Tutu style commission to dig up the truth on the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia, but also of Karin Grech and Raymond Caruana. Fr Joe is right. This is a confusion of issues on which what we need most desperately is clarity.
Unlike the other two cases, Daphne Caruana Galizia was personally targeted for the death that she was sent to. And unlike the other two cases, the danger is real and present. If anything can be done to learn more about the deaths of Karin Grech and Raymond Caruana, we will all be better for it.
But determining the wider circumstances behind Daphne Caruana Galizia’s death is a matter of immediate urgency. People who could have been responsible to allow this assassination to happen could still be in a position to arrange the same for others. Her family and her colleagues are exposed to dangers which the government is determined not to find out how to prevent.
When international lobbyists and the family of Daphne Caruana Galizia argue with the government that it should do what any other democratic government would have done long ago, they are not looking to reverse Daphne Caruana Galizia’s killing. They are confronting the reality that the lack of safety for journalists and critics in Malta caused one too many death already.
It is perverse to see the Attorney General arguing for the government why an independent inquiry should not be held. No lawyer is expected to be complicit in the crimes of their client.
People carry the coffin of Kamal Naghchband, who was killed in the Strasbourg attack. Photograph: Patrick Hertzog/AFP/Getty Images