What a fine mess we’re in

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2020-11-01T11:16:29+01:00Sun, 1st Nov '20, 11:16|

The revelations by PN MP Jason Azzopardi and the follow up reports in the press about the alleged involvement of sitting and former Labour politicians in crimes, would, in ordinary times, in ordinary countries, start a frenzied demand from the public to know what the prime minister is doing to distance himself from crooks and [...]

PN distances itself from Ryan Mercieca

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2020-11-01T10:22:18+01:00Sun, 1st Nov '20, 10:22|

Ryan Mercieca, who contested the 2017 elections on the PN ticket, told this website he was still considering running for the seat vacated by the death of Frederick Azzopardi. But if he decided to run, he would be doing so without the blessing of the party that put him forward for election three years ago. [...]

RIGHT OF REPLY: Ryan Mercieca Replies

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2020-11-01T08:23:10+01:00Sun, 1st Nov '20, 08:23|

Ryan Mercieca sent in this answer to this earlier post. As usual comments under a Right of Reply statement will not be posted. Dear Mr. Delia, Hope this email finds you well. First of all, let me take the opportunity to thank you for your journalistic work and fight against corruption. With reference to your article published [...]

Pissup. Brewery. Can’t do it.

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2020-10-30T14:55:44+01:00Fri, 30th Oct '20, 14:55|

Karol Aquilina raised an issue in parliament yesterday that may seem at first like a piece of administrative pedantry. In April 2020, the government announced the appointment of a new financial intelligence agency board for a 3-year term. The appointment followed the procedure required by the law regulating money laundering. So far so good. But [...]

Trial judge dismisses all 124 technical objections by alleged Daphne killers. Trial to start “when it’s their turn.”

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2020-10-30T13:38:34+01:00Fri, 30th Oct '20, 13:36|

The court has just completed an 11-month process of evaluating 117 objections raised by lawyers for Alfred and George Degiorgio and 7 objections raised by lawyers for Vince Muscat, who have been in preventive custody since they were charged in December 2017 for the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia. The court also dismissed an objection [...]

Big test for institutional independence

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2020-10-30T17:17:43+01:00Fri, 30th Oct '20, 13:16|

Maybe it’s because I binged on the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit, but I’m visualising this as a middle game on a chess board of a match I’m watching, but I’m not smart enough to guess where this will go. Times of Malta is reporting that the CEO of the financial regulatory body “suspended himself” [...]

False economies

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2020-10-30T12:28:22+01:00Fri, 30th Oct '20, 11:14|

Why is the government so hostile to the idea of increasing the number of judges and magistrates? It is facile to say that such a move “wouldn’t solve everything”. Of course, it wouldn’t. Outside a chemistry lab there’s nothing you can add to anything that would change everything about something. Granted some judges are more [...]

Doppeldoppelgänger

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2020-10-30T10:13:56+01:00Fri, 30th Oct '20, 10:13|

Will clumsy functionaries paid by tax payers to make politicians look good on social media, please mind their fingers? I remember as a junior staffer helping out in the organisation of a visit by a Chinese Assistant Deputy Under Prime Minister or something, which from a country of more than a billion people is still [...]

GUEST POST: A Proud Prime Minister

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2020-10-30T09:46:34+01:00Fri, 30th Oct '20, 09:46|

A proud man is always looking down on things and people; and, of course, as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you. – C.S. Lewis Prime Minister Robert Abela is a proud man. He said it many a time during his two-hour reply to the leader of opposition’s [...]

Ménage à quatre

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2020-10-29T16:27:35+01:00Thu, 29th Oct '20, 16:27|

A playboy casino owner with links to the underworld, a financial regulator, a gaming lawyer and a staffer for a banana republic’s prime minister walked into the lobby of the Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas ... Sounds like the beginning of a porn parody for a Scorsese classic. But what’s happening here is neither titillating [...]

Service providers

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2020-10-29T12:10:10+01:00Thu, 29th Oct '20, 11:53|

If you provide professional advice on financial services, you must work within a published set of rules. You must prove you are trained and qualified to do the job, and if you’re caught acting unprofessionally you can be fined, or your license to provide the service is removed. This is done to protect your customers. [...]

This is how they take away your rights

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2020-10-29T08:25:33+01:00Thu, 29th Oct '20, 08:25|

You could dismiss this One TV “story” as yet another small-time opportunity for Labour to pick on Jason Azzopardi, someone their people love to hate. But being a political party does not absolve them of their responsibilities to democracy, and we have gone too far down the road of tyranny if we stop worrying about [...]

Joe Cuschieri may be in breach of ECB ethics rules

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2020-10-29T08:00:59+01:00Thu, 29th Oct '20, 08:00|

Joe Cuschieri admitted yesterday that while serving as CEO of the Malta Financial Services Authority he travelled to Las Vegas with Yorgen Fenech to advise him on “regulatory issues”. The financial services regulator told The Malta Independent yesterday he gave his time and advice without payment or compensation. Joe Cuschieri is one of the two [...]

MGA licensed non-compliant Tumas Group gaming business

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2020-10-28T18:38:47+01:00Wed, 28th Oct '20, 18:38|

  The Malta Gaming Authority licensed a company owned by the Tumas Group, Oracle Gaming Shops Ltd, as a Type 1 Gaming Services company. The licensing was granted in 2020. Employees of Oracle Gaming Shops were told the company was set up to take over the gaming businesses that were run by Yorgen Fenech before [...]

Yorgen’s angels

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2020-10-28T18:39:57+01:00Wed, 28th Oct '20, 15:31|

Will every government minister, parliamentarian, regulator, police officer and sundry person who should have really known better who accepted Yorgen Fenech’s hospitality in the last three years or so, been on his plane though they weren’t his pilot, fucked him though they weren’t Mrs Fenech, driven him around though they weren’t his driver, cooked pasta [...]

PODCAST: Setting the date

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2020-10-28T15:21:14+01:00Wed, 28th Oct '20, 13:37|

Manuel Delia · Setting The Date The power of the prime minister to set any date they please within a 5-year term of a parliament to call a general election is another power the prime minister should not have. Rather nostalgically, they call it ‘the prime minister’s prerogative’. A word like prerogative should have no [...]

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