Iss hej, they invited Anglu and not Toni or Jason
Mummy, hallewni barra!
Jason Micallef and Toni Abela are licking their wounds after not being invited to the presidential inauguration yesterday. The thing that gets me most about this is their complete lack of dignity in demonstrating their hurt and offence to everyone who will look and listen.
We all know by now that they’re crass, but this takes more than crassness. It takes brainlessness (and yes, we knew that, too).
Jason told a newspaper that this is the first time since he was appointed secretary-general, that he was not invited to a presidential ‘function’.
His opposite number in the Nationalist Party was present.
“I always received invitations from the Office of the President, for these events. The last time I was invited to a presidential function was last Sunday, in fact,” he said. Ah, but that was a different president. This new president is the man who Jason stabbed in the back during the party leadership election, when he was backing a horse – sorry, a jackass actually – called Joseph.
So OK, it doesn’t say much for the new president’s ability to be magnanimous that he almost certainly had a hand in crossing Jason off the guest list, but you just have to laugh. People like Jason want to have their cake and eat it. Muscat can do it because he’s party leader and has a constitutional role, so in his constitutional role his presence is requested here and there, even if he chooses not to go and to eat hamburger in Sicily with Anglu Farrugia instead. Jason is a constitutional nonentity. He can’t burn his bridges and expect to walk over them.
When he didn’t receive his invitation along with everyone else, Jason reported the matter to his leader (what is it about these Laburisti that reminds me of those T-shirts that were fashionable when I was a child, T-shirts emblazoned with a Martian and the legend ‘Take me to your leader’?). The leader was suitably astonished. “The leader was obviously surprised on hearing the news,” Jason told the press. Markets crash and bombs explode, but The News is that Jason hasn’t been invited to a party.
Toni Abela wasn’t invited either. He was doubly piqued because the other half of that Tweedledum and Tweedledee duo, Anglu Farrugia, was on the guest list and got to go. Min jaf how smug he felt. No hamburger in Catania on this occasion. Toni Abela, being the backwoods Billy he is, actually rang the Office of the President demanding to know why he is never on the president’s guest list. “I was told that I do not feature in the protocol list,” he reported back to the newspapers. God, how I laughed.
But that backwoods Billy just kept right on pressing home his point. “But my question is why? Am I not an official, too? My question still remains unanswered.” Well, no, you crass and vulgar clown – they answered it.
Labour – not so much an embarrassment of riches as an embarrassment of hamallagni.
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http://www.samtsai.com/diy/images/StopBabyCrying.jpg
That was very petty of Dr George Abela. He should have risen above it all and let the protocol officers do their job. Abela still has to learn that magnanimity comes with the territory. I also didn’t like the way he and Joe Azzopardi were on the Friday night show telling people to come to Valletta on Saturday to greet the new president. You don’t tell people to come to cheer you the night before you become president of a country. If people want to come they just come.
[Daphne – Agreed.]
Those responsible for this misunderstanding shoud be made to answer. The President office shoud explain on this discrimination.
C. Fenech – “Those responsible for this misunderstanding” and none other than Jason Micallef and Toni Abela themselves. People simply should NOT ask to be invited.
I think those responsible for this misunderstanding shoud be made to answer. The President office shoud issue a statement to clear this case.
C. Fenech – “Those responsible for this misunderstanding” and none other than Jason Micallef and Toni Abela themselves.
People simply should NOT ask to get invited.
Abela also made news as the first president to insist on a mass being celebrated before he takes the oath of office. One would have thought that a president from a Labour background would want to keep the state separate from the church. I would have expected such a move from Eddie Fenech Adami who goes to church everyday, but he didn’t ask for a mass before his inauguration. Secular state? Where? Malta?
[Daphne – Yes, that was dreadful, wasn’t it? A failure to distinguish between a private, personal celebration and a state occasion. I hope we’re not going to see many more of these slip-ups.]
In his inaugural speech, George Abela pledged to be a president of all Maltese. Presumably, this doesn’t include the roughly 50% of us who are lapsed Catholics.
[Daphne – Maybe he’s going to show tolerance towards us.]
Ah, but could the idea not have been to involve all the family – and to maybe serve less as a display of piety and more as a stage for one particular “voice student”?
What about the walkabout immediately after the mass, prior to Abela taking his oath of office? Was he trying to upstage the much-loved Eddie, who was still president at that particular moment?
(Having said that, Eddie’s shoes will be hard to fill – he was much-loved and respected, u, fuq kollox, jaf x’imur u x’ma’ jmurx.)
Oh for God’s sake Jason, just grow up and thank your god you are still sitting pretty in that chair……and use your time to educate yourself so perhaps you lift yourself up a notch or two. ……………kemm bqajtu hamalli. Mind you tista taqra kotba kemm trid, ghax as they say, if you ain’t got it, you’ll never get it.
C. Fenech,
Don’t worry, Joseph Muscat was given a doggy bag with goodies for Jason and Toni. Problem solved.
Hope it didn’t include chips, because their collective supply is large enough as it is.
The invitations of the Investiture Ceremony of a new President are not issued by the Office of the President but by the Office of the Speaker of the House of Representives please note……
However, for sure all Secretary Generals are usually included in this list so there must be some misunderstanding
So why are Toni and Jason complaining to and about the office of the president?
I have a sneaking suspicion that, had they been invited, they would have had a “previous engagement” anyway, simply to snub him..
@ Daphne
Don’t you think that the president had to forget his past disputes and start a fresh page as he is called the president of unity? In every party there is some sort of dispute and different ideas clash, not less in the PN. I believe that Dr Abela was obliged start turning the page….
I wonder who the hamallu is Daphne! The smart Nationalists are ashamed of supporting the same party you do.
[Daphne – Hardly.]
Dan hu l-hamallu Mark.
http://www.illum.com.mt/2009/04/05/t9.html
U salvagg ukoll.
Just learnt that Jason was actually invited but somehow the invite was not received.
[Daphne – It was in the post, along with that cheque.]
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/2009/04/05/t12.html
Who’s telling the truth?
U biex jidher martri
http://www.maltastar.com/pages/ms09dart.asp?a=927
How come only maltastar is showing this piece of news? Is it true anyway?
http://maltarightnow.com/?module=news&at=Mhux+veru+li+Jason+Micallef+ma+kienx+mistieden+g%26%23295%3Ba%26%23267%3B%2D%26%23267%3Berimonja+tas%2DSibt&t=a&aid=99811323&cid=19
Surely Labour should issue a statement about all this. And no, it was not a misunderstanding. Jason Micallef WAS invited, so what is the idea behind this? Was he trying to give the president a bad start? Labour, please note and explain.
@ Andrea Sammut
…and Caesar should have embraced Brutus after the latter stuck a knife in his back! Or, was it his chest? I forget right now, it happened so long ago.
The King/Queen of England is also crowned in a church ceremony. Is this also a slip-up? What is so wrong with asking for a Divine blessing at the start of such an onerous (and delicate) task?
[Daphne – That’s because the British sovereign is not just head of the Church of England, but considered to rule by divine authority. You can hardly say the same for the president of a republic.]
@ Alexandra Borg
Very rarely there are misunderstandings regarding matters of protocol. I more likely suspect that protocol also includes the vetting of the list by the incoming president. Inviting Jason would have been akin to an invitation for Brutus to sit next to Caesar.
[Daphne – Apparently, he was invited and the invitation card was lost in the post.]
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090406/local/jason-micallef-congratulates-new-president
“Mr Micallef said there was no need because he could not attend, since he had a prior, family commitment.”
But not so strong a commitment that he didn’t kick up a fuss when he thought he was not invited. If attendance is optional, that fuss was even more inappropriate. If it isn’t optional, then no commitment could have been more pressing.
So here’s another hamburger-eater. Or maybe he was just too busy washing the egg off his face.
Mr Micallef said there was no need because he could not attend, since he had a prior family commitment. Well, surely Jason Micallef knew months ago that the event will be held on the 4th April. So what is this excuse?
And now he’s suing in-Nazzjon for libel:
http://www.maltastar.com/pages/ms09dart.asp?a=927