The government declared in court today it changed its mind about appealing against a court decision that accepted Repubblika’s request that the question on whether Malta’s judges are truly independent is sent to the European Court of Justice. This means that the European Court will be asked to rule whether the power of Malta’s prime [...]
A Magistrate has accepted a request from NGO Repubblika for an inquiry into whether Jean Philippe Chetcuti, a senior lawyer at the Chetcuti Cauchi law firm, committed crimes when he was caught in a camera sting operation by French TV journalists admitting he could arrange for a Maltese passport for an African client with a [...]
Environment NGOs were pressing yesterday for Elizabeth Ellul’s resignation from the Planning Board. Things came to a head when the ruins of a room were approved by the Board she’s part of, for conversion into a sprawling villa out on a cliff-face in Qala. Elizabeth Ellul expected everyone to ignore her proximity to the developer, [...]
Just a quick note for Joseph Muscat, Owen Bonnici, Konrad Mizzi, Keith Schembri, Edward Scicluna, Chris Cardona, Ian Borg and so on. You thought everyone would be too scared, too compromised, too blind to oppose you. You thought you could control all outcomes. And most of the time you were right. Many are scared, [...]
Magistrate Doreen Clarke accepted a request filed by NGO Repubblika and ordered an inquiry into the conduct of three government Ministers in the privatisation of three public hospitals. The Magistrate found that Repubblika’s allegations about crimes of money laundering and corruption involving Ministers Chris Cardona, Edward Scicluna and Konrad Mizzi deserve to be investigated. A [...]
Dredging up the dregs is what scraping the barrel is all about and when you watch the dregs scraping away at their own bottomless cesspit, it’s not a pretty sight. We witnessed this in all its putrid glory last week when, amongst all the copious corruption cases which constitute our daily fare, there was Saviour [...]
The government’s decision to appeal this morning’s court ruling that the question on whether the way Malta appoints its judges is in conflict with the EU Treaty should be referred to the European Court of Justice is a callous waste of time. That’s all this appeal achieves. The Court this morning did not decide Repubblika [...]
Sent in by urban planner Dr John Ebejer. For many years Dr Ebejer held various positions relating to planning and development at the Planning Authority, the Building Industry Consultative Council and relevant ministries. Part 1 of this piece was uploaded yesterday. Decisions on investment, development and planning can be fairly complex. In the past I [...]
Statement by Repubblika, #occupyjustice and manueldelia.com: On the 16th of every month we organise a vigil to remember Daphne Caruana Galizia and to call for truth and justice for her and for her journalism. We will continue to do this until truth is known and justice is served. But with all that is happening in [...]
Sent in by urban planner Dr John Ebejer. For many years Dr Ebejer held various positions relating to planning and development at the Planning Authority, the Building Industry Consultative Council and relevant ministries. Recently the Prime Minister called on developers to show less ‘greed’. This was his reaction to the strong criticism for the many [...]
MaltaToday’s monthly survey shows Joseph Muscat losing ground and Adrian Delia gaining some. The support of the former still exceeds the support of the latter two to one. But the shift is interesting because the PN over the last weeks made a pitch for xenophobes who would be prepared to change their response in a [...]
I didn’t expect Raphael Vassallo to like what I had to say in my article on how the mafia works. I spoke about omertà, the silent conspiracy of people who elect to say they believe the mafia does not exist. And then I used one example in a line Raphael Vassallo and MaltaToday has taken [...]
Instead of speaking about hundreds of millions of euro paid out to VGH and to Steward Health Care taken from the national health service budget while cancer patients fighting for their very lives beg for charity from the Community Chest Fund, we spent the last 24 hours wondering what was in Ivan Camilleri’s check-out trolley [...]
Updated 02.11.2019 07:50 Adds MGA's reply Schoolyard retorts are a thriving industry in this mediocre country of self-delusion. We take criticism as well as feudal kings and we'd throw our critics in the crocodile pit if we had one. The UK gaming regulator Neil McArthur echoed the complaints of other European law enforcement and regulating agencies [...]
The Times of Malta is a weakness in the great Keith Schembri strategy for unassailable power and unquestioned authority. The organisation, imperfect as it no doubt is, has responded to the threat to media freedom imposed by the present regime with defiance. Their best reporters have worked hard and continue to work hard on publishing [...]
Five witnesses gave consistent testimony. Neville Gafà solicited bribes from them in exchange for a public service: a medical visa. Some of the witnesses testified they were denied the service because they refused to pay the bribe. Some of the witnesses said Neville Gafà used uniformed policemen to bully his victims into paying him. Some [...]
I don’t like Justin Schembri. That’s ok. I imagine the feeling is mutual. I’ve bashed him before for his Facebook behaviour which he would then try to spin and justify. Today he celebrated Matteo Salvini’s win in Umbria. Although he will probably retract it again, after some half-blinded apparatchik at PN HQ makes him, Justin [...]
The trial of Daphne Caruana Galizia's assassins is no ordinary trial. It’s a mafia trial. Just because we don’t call it that in our law, does not mean it isn’t. Something is or isn’t independently of whether the law says so though of course the law needs to say so if something is to be [...]
From my article in The Sunday Times today: "Before 2013, Labour never said anything about privatising public hospitals, a socialist anathema. Socialists are averse to privatising anything, let alone the national health service, the levelling equaliser for a fair society. Privatised hospitals providing free public healthcare cost public funds one and a half times more [...]
The Sunday Times’ report of this morning about scenes out of 19th century plantation abuse of black people within our very own prison is paradoxically both unsurprising and shocking. More than a hundred people were arraigned in court charged with the violence of last week inside the concentration camp they were locked up in. The [...]