All those hours of listening to Konrad Mizzi’s vacuous, irrelevant, opaque, and interminable “opening statement” filibustered over something like three months proved, predictably, to be an entirely wasted consumption of mind-meltingly boring time. I look with some half-hearted sympathy at Beppe Fenech Adami and his colleagues on that committee. I think what it must feel [...]
The Appeals Court has today ruled that it-Torċa sought to damage the reputation of Occupy Justice activist and Repubblika founder Pia Zammit when the Labour-leaning newspaper repeatedly printed a backstage photo taken 10 years earlier of the actress in an 'Allo! 'Allo! costume. A lower court had dismissed Pia Zammit libel suit against it-Torċa’s editor [...]
Photo: REUTERS/Darrin Zammit Lupi Why do Joseph Muscat and his henchmen hate Repubblika so much? Why are they making Robert Aquilina one of a short-list of national hate figures, public enemies of Labour’s cause for a perpetual monopoly on power? Because Robert Aquilina is a leading figure in the effort of the few [...]
To justify his very public assault on the inquiring magistrate who ordered a search in Joseph Muscat’s home and officer, Glenn Bedingfield refers to past criticism of Judge Consuelo Scerri Herrera and Judge Giovanni Grixti by people like the author of the blog you’re reading. He specifically refers to me writing about Magistrate Charmaine Galea [...]
People who have read too much history for their own good cannot escape the sadness that the present events must cause them. Glenn Bedingfield took the floor in Parliament yesterday for a 15-minute rant of scapegoating hatred identifying targets for the enmity of his party’s followers. He named the enemies of the people du jour [...]
Earlier I wrote about the Opposition sleeping on the job, not being alert enough to oppose a motion by the government appointing Rosianne Cutajar to Parliament’s health committee. In its defence the Opposition called it a motion by stealth. That was a weird way to describe anything moved in Parliament because all motions are read [...]
Malta Today reported that while police were searching Joseph Muscat’s Burmarrad home their colleagues were also rummaging in a Sa Maison office held in Joseph Muscat’s name. Joseph Muscat has an office and doesn’t always work from home. OK, no need to blink so far. If you’re going to bill people €500,000 for investment advice [...]
And I’m glad it was Therese Comodini Cachia. On Twitter she shared Times of Malta’s report of the scene in court when its journalist Julian Bonnici was being questioned by the politician who brought a lawsuit against him, Adrian Delia. Do you find the questioning of a journalist by an MP in his own case [...]
UPDATED: 11:05 with PN statement Rosianne Cutajar admitted receiving €9,000 in cash as a “birthday gift” from Yorgen Fenech, the man charged with killing Daphne Caruana Galizia. She admitted she didn’t declare the gift. The record shows she spoke in Yorgen Fenech’s defence in Malta’s Parliament and at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of [...]
Read this Lovin Malta report of another point brought up by Robert Abela yesterday. He told business owners being “terrorised be institutions” to speak to him directly over WhatsApp or some other way that would avoid a paper trail so that he could defend them from the government of which he is chief executive. I [...]
This is my article in the current Winter edition of the Index on Censorship Magazine. This is a link to subscribe to the magazine.
Robert Abela has declared his intention to vote against and to instruct his MPs to vote down a draft law introducing anti-mafia legislation in our statute books. He’s only spoken in the negative about some of the other proposals and said nothing good about the rest of the package transposed by the Opposition from the [...]
There are just some premises that betray the unintended motivations of those who postulate them. “Who farted?” is a question asked by the person in the room implicitly admitting they did the deed. It’s just one of those things. Who smelt it dealt it. This is a South Park way of saying that the guy [...]
Even taking into account all the state capture in Joseph Muscat’s times, I think the point we’re at now in terms of the quivering weakness of the rule of law is as terrible as any we’ve seen. Robert Abela, with the full might of the executive and the ruling party within him and behind him, [...]
Robert Abela cannot outplay Joseph Muscat’s tune so he dances to it instead. Consider the quote on l-orizzont’s front page today: “Għall-PN, it-tisħiħ tal-istituzzjonijiet ifisser li jdaħħluhom fil-logħba partiġġjana.” That’s a direct quote from remarks by the prime minister who, while denying he’s doing just that, is increasing the pressure on the inquiring magistrate looking [...]
I doubt Robert Abela privately thinks Joseph Muscat is a god who can do no wrong. But Robert Abela knows the only reason he was elected party leader instead of Chris Fearne was the fact that Chris Fearne had signalled he would not worship on the Joseph Muscat altar after Muscat’s resignation. Robert Abela instead [...]
I understand the scepticism. Even the cynicism. We’ve been through many dramatic moments that turned out to be largely meaningless not to think that a raid on Joseph Muscat’s house, two years after the inquiry it is part of started, five years after allegations of wrongdoing became known, and days after the subject of the [...]
A few days ago on the Central Bank's official Instagram account, Edward Scicluna mourned David Sassoli the president of the European Parliament who died in office. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Central Bank of Malta (@centralbankmalta) Fair enough you'd say since Edward Scicluna was himself an MEP and he [...]
A few more observations about remarks by Joseph Muscat and Robert Abela after yesterday’s police raid on the former prime minister’s house. They said the same thing which suggests they co-ordinated their remarks. From Times of Malta’s interview with Joseph Muscat: “Muscat said his faith in the inquiry had now been dented, as his initial [...]
