Alfred Sant always had a way with words. Not in the cheesy chat up lines in a bar sort of way. But in the succinct slogan that sticks. He had this phrase “ħbieb tal-ħbieb” which in its simplicity, and the daring rip off from the English commonplace ‘friends of friends’ came to mean much more than getting someone to get you a VIP ticket to a rock concert.
Look at this new ‘think tank’ set up by Clayton Bartolo, the junior technology minister. Leave aside for the moment that government agencies, even advisory committees, are not ‘think tanks’. Think tanks are fora for research and the development of ideas that by definition need to come from outside government. But there it is. Owen Bonnici set up his own ‘think tank’ and now all of them want one.
Look who Clayton Bartolo got to give him advice on carving a competitive future through to exploitation of technology.
Brian Tonna’s daughter, Beverly.
And Consuelo Scerri Herrera’s daughter, Justine.
And they’re qualified to provide advice on economic development and the use of technologies, how? They’re lawyers. Ah. That’s all right then.
You could be generous and say the ‘think tank’ includes other qualified people. But if you said that you’d reduce Dr Tonna and Dr Scerri Herrera as mere partisan tokens. That doesn’t help their case one bit, does it?