A sock down his gym shorts

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2020-02-26T09:03:22+01:00Wed, 26th Feb '20, 09:03|

Alex Agius Saliba has good reason to be proud of the extraordinary achievement of his election to the European Parliament. Many people try it. Few succeed. So, he has undoubted qualities that have got him so far. But he seems to need us to be more impressed yet. In a mail-shot brochure he sent out [...]

Corruption in the local film industry: firing the commissioner is not enough. Though it’s a start.

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2020-02-26T08:12:17+01:00Wed, 26th Feb '20, 08:12|

The government needs to do more than fire the Film Commissioner. That is what an association of local film producers asked the government to do but that request does not address the suspicion that former Labour Party employee Johann Grech was narrowing the field of suppliers in Malta in order to profit directly from the [...]

Oral culpability

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2020-02-25T10:51:03+01:00Tue, 25th Feb '20, 10:51|

After the piss poor performance by the prime minister’s staffers, there is now a frantic scramble to discredit the public inquiry into the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia. Prominently there’s Alfred Sant’s Facebook post that works on the principle that ridicule is the best way to undermine any process that relies on seriousness, procedure and [...]

GUEST POST: The very ‘umble Robert Abela (Part 2)

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2020-02-25T09:24:24+01:00Tue, 25th Feb '20, 09:24|

This post follows up from yesterday’s post on “the ‘umble Robert Abela”. So, what are we to expect? Undoubtedly, more of the same. We have seen the shameful humbuggery at the public enquiry of insolent quacks or so called “persons of trust”. These puny individuals strut around Al Capone style. They think they are accountable [...]

GUEST VERSES: Sell the country

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2020-02-25T09:07:06+01:00Tue, 25th Feb '20, 09:07|

Sent in by a visitor to Malta who left shocked by what she saw and heard. Sell the country I was a likely labour lad. Not too good and not too bad. Not too dim and not too smart. Just the one to play the part. In politics I made my way Every dog must [...]

Stand up for your right to know. Nobody else will.

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2020-02-24T11:50:32+01:00Mon, 24th Feb '20, 11:50|

Your right to know what’s being done with your economy depends on journalists scrutinising people who are licensed to operate banks here. Support journalism and support the fight against libel tourism and SLAPP lawsuits designed to prevent you from making informed choices for your wellbeing. SLAPP lawsuits like the one the owner of Satabank filed [...]

A tale of two carnivals

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2020-02-24T11:18:41+01:00Mon, 24th Feb '20, 11:18|

This photo was taken in Valletta yesterday afternoon during carnival. In an earlier post I showed photos of the state the Daphne protest was found in this morning. Meanwhile, at around the same time, in Nadur yesterday:

GUEST POST: The very ‘umble Robert Abela

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2020-02-24T08:32:19+01:00Mon, 24th Feb '20, 08:32|

Sent in by someone known to me: “I suppose you are quite a great lawyer?” I said, after looking at him for some time. “Me, Master Copperfield? Oh no! I’m a very ‘umble person. I am well aware that I am the ‘umblest person going,” said Uriah Heep modestly. “Let the other be where he [...]

What Owen sowed

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2020-02-24T08:22:39+01:00Mon, 24th Feb '20, 08:22|

Activists found the Daphne Caruana Galizia protest memorial in Valletta in this state this morning. They have cared for it everyday since a court decision to condemn the government for breaching fundamental human rights for "cleaning" the memorial every day. In that decision the court said the government through Minister Owen Bonnici made the memorial [...]

Italian Senate by-election victory dedicated to those seeking the truth on the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia

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2020-02-24T07:42:19+01:00Mon, 24th Feb '20, 07:42|

Veteran Italian journalist Sandro Ruotolo was elected last night to the Italian Senate replacing the former Senator for the Naples constituency Franco Ortolani who had died in office. Sandro Ruotolo contested the election on his own ticket “Napoli con Ruotolo” but was backed by the centre-left parties Partito Democratico and the Movimento Democrazia e Autonomia. [...]

SLAPP suit filed against manueldelia.com by Satabank owner

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2020-02-22T12:36:22+01:00Sat, 22nd Feb '20, 12:36|

Christo Georgiev, Bulgarian owner of the Maltese Satabank, has filed a SLAPP suit in a court in Bulgaria for monetary compensation for damages he alleges he suffered as a result of a blog post published on this website. The blog post published in October 2018 was headlined “Satabank: And how I let them bully me [...]

Timeless

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2020-02-21T15:33:05+01:00Fri, 21st Feb '20, 15:29|

Some details from the controversial Malta carnival float featuring an effigy of the archbishop. The makers appear to have taken Charles Scicluna's hint about what should have been expected on a carnival float this year. Photos taken today.

Disproportionate response

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2020-02-21T20:02:00+01:00Fri, 21st Feb '20, 15:04|

Glenn Bedingfield took the stand today at the inquiry into the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. Even after two years of universal condemnation, of films, books, articles and documentaries carrying an objective interpretation of what has happened in Malta over the years leading to Daphne Caruana Galizia’s killing and of what happened since, of visiting [...]

GUEST POST: Mirror, mirror

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2020-02-21T13:52:19+01:00Fri, 21st Feb '20, 13:52|

Filed by Spartacus. In 1977, Dr Eddie Fenech Adami was elected as leader of the Nationalist Party. Some time later, at a rally held at the Plaza cinema in Sliema, Dr Fenech Adami delivered his first public speech. In this speech he expressed the danger that was looming then: the merging of the GWU with [...]

Visiting hour

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2020-02-21T15:31:37+01:00Fri, 21st Feb '20, 13:44|

I filed a judicial protest in court today against minister Byron Camilleri and three of his officials: the prisons director, the director for detention centres and the principal immigration officer. I claimed that their rejection of my request to visit detention centres and the prison is an abuse of human rights. Of course, we’re not [...]

The government must explain the lies

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2020-02-21T12:04:40+01:00Fri, 21st Feb '20, 12:04|

Neville Gafà’s testimony this week at the inquiry into the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia contradicts statements made in 2018 by then Foreign Minister Carmelo Abela. One of them is lying. We need the government to tell us who. This week Neville Gafà said he held a diplomatic passport. He said he represented Malta in [...]

Neville the humanitarian

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2020-02-20T11:45:09+01:00Thu, 20th Feb '20, 11:45|

The government still needs to come clean about Neville Gafà Yesterday’s testimony at the inquiry into the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia opens up fresh questions which the government must answer. For the first time ever Neville Gafà gave what he claimed was a sincere account of his function in government, at least over the [...]

Venice Commission President denies Malta sought advice on police commissioner appointment procedure

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2020-02-20T11:14:50+01:00Thu, 20th Feb '20, 11:14|

The president of the Venice Commission Gianni Buquicchio told this website that “no formal advice was yet sought or provided” with regards to the changes to the law currently being debated in Parliament on the manner of appointing the police chief. Gianni Buquicchio told this website that Byron Camilleri’s Ministry only sought “informal consultations”. This [...]

Symptomatic of the nation

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2020-02-20T08:42:23+01:00Thu, 20th Feb '20, 08:42|

    Judge Joseph Said Pullicino’s questioning of witnesses in the public inquiry into the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia is incisive. There are few pleasures in this experience. But watching people like Nigel Vella and Matthew Carbone squirm under the pressure of his deceptively gentle questions is a considerable compensation for the dread and [...]

The Venice Commission does not give advice over the phone

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2020-02-19T18:14:05+01:00Wed, 19th Feb '20, 18:14|

It is truly worrying to see Robert Abela’s government adopt the methods of its predecessor. One such habit was Owen Bonnici’s classic pivot of saying that the reforms he proposed were “approved by the Venice Commission”. That’s when they had not at all been approved by the Venice Commission. Byron Camilleri in parliament yesterday claimed [...]

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