Comments on: Hmmm, fresh questions about the provenance of that mouse-skull

By: Graham C.

Graham C. — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 22:28:51 +0000

€200 for the most powerful thing you can possibly own – a vote? I never knew the Maltese were so dirt cheap. Either way, they’re scum & now they can thank Anglu for it, unless they were scum to begin with.

By: Chris II

Chris II — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 18:00:22 +0000

I can only put in one comment:

I hope that Anglu Farrugia is charged with contempt of court for wasting its time!

By: taxpayer

taxpayer — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 14:45:23 +0000

Oh, one of the witnesses is that Mr Zammit, known as Is-Sej. Just a reminder that he was implicated in the judges corruption case.

[Daphne – Bis-serjeta? One of Anglu Farrugia’s witnesses is a convicted criminal, a go-between who took money from a drug trafficker’s agent to a judge, to reduce the sentence? Oh, very credible….Imissu jisthi, jekk jaf kif.]

By: Fausto Majistral

Fausto Majistral — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:57:56 +0000

Isn’t Edwin Cioffi the guy who was charged with the murder of Ganni Lepre sometime in the early 1990s? I remember from the evidence it turned out that Lepre, a known criminal, had harassed Cioffi for years (harassment which included death threats for him and his family, mind you).

Lepre found Cioffi “hobz ghal snienu” … as we know, bullies the world over will not pick on just anyone, they pick on the weak, the meek and the introverted. Cioffi shot Lepre, with the same gun Lepre had given him to shoot his father-in-law.

Is he being picked upon again? Police “interrogated him at length” … because he gave a man a lift? Being the cook how did he threaten to make good his threats?

By: assistant commissioner 87

assistant commissioner 87 — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:56:37 +0000

@ H.P Baxxter: you have to be in the polling station to understand what I am saying about mobile phones. The loyalty of many assistant commissioners is towards their party, and being what we are, one cannot rule out the taking of a photo of the completed voting document by the person doing the voting.

I remember when Dom Mintoff wanted the “trusted friend” system. The attempts to bypass the secrecy of how one votes started over 50 years ago. Are we going to leave technology (mobile phones) to wreak havoc on the right to vote without undue pressure, real or imaginary? This is Malta not Sweden.

It took just 750 people to swing the vote in the last election.

By: Fausto Majistral

Fausto Majistral — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:49:45 +0000

It seems that the allegations are only being made by one of the employees, the one who was definitely fired. The second employee testified that she was *told* to vote for the Nationalist Party.

By: H.P. Baxxter

H.P. Baxxter — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:20:32 +0000

@ assistant commissioner:

I get your point, but name one European country where you have to surrender your mobile phone to vote. Or where you have police officers at each polling station, for that matter. When I voted at the local council elections, as an EU citizen, in a certain EU country which shall remained unnamed, I didn’t even see any party officials hanging about. The only persons present were staff from the municipal office or local council, call it what you will. And that’s the way it should be. It sends a powerful message: Elections are organised and run by the government, not by political parties.

We’re paranoid about elections, that’s what, and we do our best to make 2009 seem like 1987.

By: Darren Azzopardi

Darren Azzopardi — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:13:16 +0000

But where is there any evidence that the employees lied?

Just because they said that they had sold their votes, and you don’t believe them doesn’t make them liars either.

[Daphne – If I didn’t like you, Darrin, I would be very cross. Think clearly, because there are only two options and both make them liars. They said that they sold their votes. If it’s not true, then they are liars. And if it’s true, then they are fraudsters.]

By: Darren Azzopardi

Darren Azzopardi — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:00:27 +0000

Hmm, maybe because in real life, such things happen? After all, there is no evidence that he didn’t blackmail them is there? Put yourself in their shoes. The employer told them straight and plain that if Labour were elected, they were not to turn up for work. The employer didn’t put an economic argument about the respective parties tax policies, did he?

[Daphne – Once again, why are you so ready to believe a self-confessed liar? What’s the point of going through the court process if you already know the truth? I’m sorry, but something just doesn’t wash about this story. And it’s too much of a coincidence that it’s the ‘mouse-head’ people under siege again. As for that ‘If Labour is elected don’t bother turning up for work’, that’s not a threat, for heaven’s sake. It’s the kind of remark thousands of people make before every election: will the last one out please turn off the lights, that kind of thing.]

By: Darren Azzopardi

Darren Azzopardi — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 19:41:33 +0000

You don’t get it do you? Despite the wrong that happened in the 80’s, this does not give a right for someone to blackmail somebody else’s vote now.

[Daphne – Why are you so ready to believe a self-confessed liar and fraudster? Or do you have another description for people who (they say) sold their vote for a pittance?]