My God, the progressive and liberal new movement doesn’t even know that the BA is a constitutional authority

Published: March 14, 2013 at 5:54pm
A trial lawyer with a  client base of cocaine traffickers, murderers and other assorted notorious criminals is now our Minister of Justice and the Police.

A trial lawyer with a client base of cocaine traffickers, murderers and other assorted notorious criminals is now our Minister of Justice and the Police.

But now it does. Because the situation has been explained to it.

Explained to Manuel Mallia? But I thought he’s a top lawyer! Tsk tsk.

I’d forgotten for a moment that he specialises in cocaine traffickers and murderers.

Oh, a startling thought has just occurred to me! Could the people with the block of cocaine at the Hal Safi Labour Party Club have been his current or former clients?

I think we should be told, don’t you?

After all, he is defence lawyer to the most notorious cocaine trafficker in the history of Malta.

That cocaine trafficker’s entire extended family voted Labour last Saturday and told everyone about it, making it clear that they were doing so because they thought a Labour government (with the cocaine trafficker’s defence lawyer comfortably installed as Minister of Justice and the Police) would rehabilitate the cocaine trafficker’s image.

How tragic to think that what we are dealing with here are Labour politicians so poorly informed about democracy that the role of the Constitution has to be explained to them.

And these are the people who have promised Constitutional reform and a ‘Second Republic’.

On timesofmalta.com:

The government has withdrawn a request for the members of the Broadcasting Authority to hand in their resignation.

Informed sources said the chairman of the BA had received a request from the Office of the Prime Minister seeking the resignation.

The members refused, pointing out that the BA was a constitutional body whose members were appointed by the President.

The position was then explained to the government and the request was withdrawn.




26 Comments Comment

  1. canon says:

    How come a lawyer with 38 years experience in legal practice makes such a blunder.

  2. Zammit says:

    I wet my pants when I read it first on The Times. Qabda dilettanti w xejn aktar.

    • Last Post says:

      Typical Mintoffian-Labourite flurry of activity to show the country that they are gaining control of the situation and at the same time show their electoral base that they are delivering on their promises.

      Once this initial sprint dies out and their true mettle comes to the fore these roadshows will be exposed for what they are.

    • Catsrbest says:

      If they were just amateurs, it would not bother me excessively.

      However, what I sense is not amateurism but malignity and the people have voted a bunch of dictators in power.

      God have mercy on us and help us. I also sense that most of them are worsE than the ones we unfortunately experienced in the late 70s AND early 80s.

  3. old-timer says:

    X’misthijja.

  4. Jozef says:

    One of Joseph’s backbenchers could very well know who the trafficker in Safi was.

    The president of the club happens to be married to her cousin.

  5. Alex Montebello says:

    Its incredible.

    The new old PL have already started fucking up, yet their supporters on the comments board of The Times – instead of shutting up and hoping things will get better – defend them with comments like “ghatuhom cans”, etc.

    Tell that to the people who nearly lost their jobs today.

    Daphne, I remember you writing something a while back about how the PN and the PL are held to different levels of expectation and accountability.

    Or, as the saying goes “what’s gander for the sauce is not goose for the turkey”.

  6. Markus says:

    We are going for a roller coaster 5 years.

    However I get the impression that most people who voted PL are there for vengeance, as if they want blood.

    Read the comments when the perm secs were ‘requested’ to resign.

    However, one has to keep in mind the multitude of promises which Joseph made. Apparently even the MEPA boards have been requested to resign now, too. Interesting.

  7. Thank You says:

    Where are you, Mr. Eddy Privitera?

  8. L. Gatt says:

    Daphne, the Herreras are loving you today.

  9. Wilson says:

    Couldn’t they wait a bit more before showing us their true colours again?

  10. Augustus says:

    Joseph is going to keep the Nationalist budget, he should also keep the Nationalist ministers as well since the ones he’s got are so incompetent.

    • Futur Imcajpar says:

      Yes, but how is he going to factor in the millions of euros he will need to fork out to pay for the expenses incurred by all the extra ministries? Have the superfluous ministries been ‘costit’?

      I was pleasantly surprised this morning to hear a labourite saying that he was shocked at the number of ministries dished out, and that we, the public, would have to foot the bill for them. It’s good to know that they put on their thinking hats once in a while.

  11. paleblue my foot! says:

    The first of many blunders by an incompetent minister who forms part of a geriatric but voluminous cabinet of a government (er…sorry…movement) which has no idea on how to run a country and does not practise what it preached and shrieked for 5 years.

  12. Gahan says:

    Biex tkun taf il-karattru ta’ dak li jkun, kull ma trid taghmel taghtih ftit setgha u tara kif juzaha.

    Manuel Mallia gie jitmellah mill-oghla ligi tal-pajjiz, ghax haseb li hu oghla mill-ligi.

    Ghal nies bhali dan diga jmissu jirrizenja u jmur jistahba.

    Gharukaza u jmissu jisthi.

  13. Frans Cassar says:

    Hi Daphne, allow me to comment for the first time since the election outcome.

    I voted PN on the 9th of March and left for a vacation with my family since my wife and I are celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary.

    When I received the news of the tsunami victory by PL, I just couldn’t believe it.

    Left speechless for hours on a beach in Mauritius and dreading the idea of coming back to my office at one of the major banks in Malta.

    After some time the 1987 election came to mind.

    In 1987, after we lived through the worst era in this country, when police safeguarded the government and not the people, citizens were deprived from freedom of speech, unemployment was high, education was decadent and the democratic rights were all trashed in the name of socialist concepts, the PN won by a mere 4000+ votes.

    Back to reality and after these 5 years of PN goverment, unemployment is at 6% and decreasing, tourism registered great figures, heavy investments in healthcare and education, the environment was a priority, lots of projects were completed to the benefit of all, and the same government managed all this within a stressed economic context, the Libyan revolution, the euro crisis which is still on, other Med countries bailed out for insolvency and the election result says that PL won with an astonishing victory of 36,000+ votes.

    All of this baffles me.

    Are my analytical skills up to it? I even told myself that it is my judgement which is flawed, given the result.

    My vacation days are coming to an end and soon I will be living in Labour (Socialist) led Malta.

    But back in Malta, I will for the first time contact the PN to give my bit to their cause because I still firmly believe that they are still the most forward-looking Party in Malta. As for the switchers, either they were brainwashed with a 5-year PL electoral campaign or else they are a bunch of selfish and arrogant individuals.

    Lastly, I also think that The Times of Malta played a major role in switching voters to PL. They misinformed, asked wrong questions to JM and gave too much exposure to the likes of Franco Debono and JPO.

    This was a cunning plan against Lawrence Gonzi, but time will tell who was on the right side of things.

  14. rjc says:

    Joseph’s answer to this gaffe will probably be the same as the one he gave after the Rabat Labour Party Club disturbance:

    “Ma nkabbruhiex’.

  15. C Falzon says:

    I find it hard to believe it is a blunder. I think it’s more a case of them testing how far they can go without being stopped.

    The call for resignation of the permanent secretaries was the first step and it seems that they got away with it as I don’t see much resistance coming from anywhere to that move.

    The call for the BA resignations is just pushing it one notch higher.

    I think we will see a lot more of the same and I don’t think it will be just this particular minister.

  16. Bubu says:

    I can’t understand why people are acting so shocked and surprised.

    In Maltese we have a saying; “Min tafu tistaqsix ghalieh.”

    These kind of totalitarian tactics are par for the course for Labour. They always do that when they have a smidgeon of power.

    They do it because their spiritual inspiration is Mintoff. He is their hero and they make no secret about it. Why wouldn’t they want to use his same tactics as far as they can push them?

  17. anthony says:

    Il-Kostituzzjoni ?

    X’nitnejjek.

    Mhux jien ktibtha.

    Deja Vu.

  18. taxxu says:

    Got his number, Daph, cause he’s kind of cute…not.

  19. dimartedi says:

    A Governusaurus Rex government, not only due to age but also due to the proportion of the brain.

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