Delicious.

Fifty-four lilac posters with purple ribbon (the colours and symbols of a woman’s birthday) were placed around Sliema, the town where Daphne Caruana Galizia, to mark the 54th anniversary of her birth this coming Sunday. Each small poster has a different caption about Daphne Caruana Galizia, most of them describing her as a person. The [...]

Il-Kenniesa made the following announcement on Facebook: Daphne Caruana Galizia would have turned 54 on Sunday. Those who have commissioned her assassination have taken that away from her. Which is why we will be meeting at Daphne’s makeshift memorial space on Sunday to remember her as a mother, daughter, wife, sister, friend but also as [...]

Strike while the iron is cold. The night Ali Sadr snuck out of the back door of his own bank carrying bags quite possibly containing evidence of a crime, the chief of police finished watching his football team on the screen of a roadside restaurant and went to bed before waking up to instructions to [...]

The action in Valletta today by activists in the NGOs who want to save migrants from drowning in the Mediterranean gets to the heart of the matter. Malta’s government are using the law to reach political ends, in the process breaching the most important law of all: the obligation of the state to safeguard the [...]

Chinese technology company Huawei has announced the Australian government blocked it from providing 5G technology for the country’s wireless networks. Australian national security agencies were concerned about alleged ties between Huawei and the Chinese Government. In the meantime, Malta’s government has a memorandum of understanding with Huawei which will see trials of 5G technology from [...]

The Superintendent of Cultural Heritage is the custodian of the archaeological and cultural heritage we don’t know about. At least that’s one of his jobs. If there’s something down there, buried in the ground, that hasn’t been unearthed yet, he’s responsible to guard it even if he doesn’t know about it. I say ‘he’ because [...]

The Bishop of Gozo, Mario Grech, has engaged lawyers to threaten a UK Catholic blogger who commented on allegations already reported by Malta Today in 2015 with criminal and civil action. The report concerns the case of Gozitan cleric Joseph Bezzina and the allegation Bishop Mario Grech shielded him from any consequence after allegations of [...]

David Casa writes a guest piece on the EU Observer today on ‘how Malta targeted him for defending the rule of law’. He speaks of three stages of punishment. “The first stage is to use the threat of lawsuits. In the past few months, I have been publicly threatened by both the FIAU and by [...]

The government changed employment laws recently. Apparently, it took dictation from the General Workers’ Union and published it without hearing the side of the story of the people who actually sign the cheques. It did so in Santa Marija week presumably because it expected lawyers for employers to be on leave, which they were, and [...]

Pilatus Bank’s owner Pilatus Holdings has today had its request to the court to block the regulatory intervention into its business denied. Pilatus Holdings lists as its directors Ali Sadr Hasheminejad and Pilatus CEO, and fellow Iranian, Hamidreza Ghanbari. In a recent statement, Ali Sadr said the Egrant inquiry vindicated him and showed any accusations of [...]

Raphael Vassallo flattered me with some attention on this morning’s Malta Today (scroll down for a copy). He had the decency of diverting his opprobrium from his masters’ preferred target: Daphne Caruana Galizia and her surviving family. A decency which Martin Scicluna did not have, writing in this morning’s Times of Malta. But really when [...]

John Vassallo completed his two-part The Sunday Times piece 'The Republic of Darkness' reviewing the Egrant inquiry. Read this: "So, with more or less the same doubtful evidence, when the judiciary in a decent country  is inclined to serve the interests of the tax-paying population rather than the fears of the innominato and his advisers, [...]

A recording of a concert given by the Re:Orchestra Quartet of Rotterdam in memory of Daphne Caruana Galizia and Jan Kuciak is available on CD. The concert was sponsored by John Vassallo and Marianne Noll and was held last May at Lapsi church in San Ġiljan. CDs are available at Agenda bookstores. Proceeds go towards [...]

Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported this week on gaming companies exploiting chronic regulatory weaknesses in law enforcement in Malta for illegal gaming activities. The story focuses on Loewen Play that runs more than 400 gambling halls in Germany in a state-approved activity. The newspaper, however, reports that Loewen Play uses Malta to dodge German regulators and illegally [...]

Accountants are often private people. They do their work diligently and quietly and often avoid drawing attention to themselves.  Vincent Camilleri, the accountant at Portmann Capital Management Ltd, will probably be surprised to find even his existence discussed in a political blog. Not to mention seeing his CV assessed by someone who, like me, does [...]

A lot has been made about lack of evidence of communication between Nexia BT and Mossack Fonseca in Panama about the ownership of Egrant. A report on investigations into Mossack Fonseca in Nevada, the United States, shows that the firm issued instructions to its Panama central computing system and the office of its Nevada subsidiary [...]

It is one thing for the Finance Minister to adopt the role of a promoter of Malta’s interests and seek to paint a pretty picture of things. It is altogether another to behave like a second-hand car salesman and strong arm the customer into disbelieving their very eyes. Edward Scicluna’s letter to the Financial Times [...]

This is the speech delivered by Ranier Fsadni at Thursday's Valletta vigil. Jien aċċettajt li niġi nkellimkom illum għaliex xbajt nisma’ lil min qatt ma rifes hawn jispjega għala jien u intom niġu ninġabru hawnhekk. Xbajt nisma’ li jien iżolat. Xbajt nisma’ li jien indannat, li ma niflaħx nara lil pajjiżi jgawdi l-aqwa żmien, li [...]

My article in today's The Sunday Times is an adaptation of my speech at Thursday's vigil in Valletta. Here's the original speech in Maltese if you prefer. Nixtieq nirringrazzja lil Daphne Caruana Galizia. Qatt daqs illum ma kien hemm tant bżonn li t-tislima tagħna għall-memorja ta’ Daphne Caruana Galizia ssir f’forma ta’ protesta.  Meta tlett [...]