This morning – the state opening of parliament
Published:
April 6, 2013 at 9:49am
It is preceded by high mass at St John’s Cathedral, attended by all members of parliament and – ahem – the Speaker of the House.
Members of parliament sit sorted on either side of the aisle, like the families of the bride and groom at a wedding mass, or men and women in Gozo churches a couple of decades ago (do they still do that?).
I have just received a text message, not from the government chairs, obviously. “Luciano Busuttil is so accustomed to sitting with the Oppositon that he automatically came to our side and tried to sit with us before he realised…”
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Gh*xx.
Stop insulting women
After Mass, Joseph and wife and all followed the Archbishop into the Sacristy. Was there no one from Protocol to direct them out of the Cathedral?
Please Daphne, give us a live commentary. Dying to hear what you think of hats, bags, shoes, postures, walks…..ah Saturday morning entertainment.
Labour MP Deborah Schembri (tad-Divorzju) carried up the offerings at the Mass.
PL evidently does not draw the line anywhere when it comes to its way of doing things.
Wizna basal qed tmexxi Malta. Wahda iktar mohfija mill-ohra.
Have you noticed one of the honourable ministers was chewing gum.
Did you see what Anton Refalo wrapped his children in for a visit to the Gozo bishop?
http://gov.mt/en/Government/Press%20Releases/Press%20Photos/PublishingImages/2013/April/day03/MGOZ_03042013_01.jpg
Does that mean all current MPs are Catholic ?
Atheist presumably…or cafe Catholics, meaning they pick and choose what they like.
He probably feels so left out by his own party that he (unconsciously) still considers himself part of the opposition
I am all for Mass, religion and blessings.
But what is Joseph Muscat doing there? What a hypocrite.
So not only does he look like a TUBA, he actually is one.
Imma l-importanti li “dokter” u “sintku”.
With all due respect, a doctorate in Malta means nothing.
My God just watched Justyne Caruana walking up to take her oath. Hasbet li qeghda fuq xi catwalk? Ma nixbax nighda -JAQQ
What a pathetic speech by the president, compiled by someone in government. An intro full of spite, hate and slander.
Does Joseph Muscat & Co. know what it means to write parliament’s opening speech?
Isn’t President Abela embarassed to read it?
The opening salvo was about arrogance, ironically read out by the man appointed president by the arrogant Lawrence Gonzi.
U halluna, ja qabda amateurs.
Irrid jilghaba tal-iblah.
I am finding it very strange that the President of Malta is reading out a speech prepared by the Government. Is this normal procedure?
[Daphne – Yes. What isn’t normal is the tone and content.]
Thank you, Daphne.
That is probably why I found it so strange. As from the first words it sounded more like a partisan speech for one of the PL’s electoral campaign events rather than a speech prepared for the Parliament’s opening session.
I really cannot stand Joseph Muscat with his preaching of unity and then blatantly doing the opposite. The speech itself couldn’t be a better example.
Do I want unity with this lot? So not.
It was just cut and paste from the MLP manifest(o) with all the naughty bits included.
Can the President send the draft speech back to the PM and tell him to tone it down , once the PM wanted to gain brownie points off the opposition from day one of parliament?
To your question as to whether in Gozo churches men and women sit sorted on either side of the aisle, the answer is definitely no. Please do not pull our legs. If you wanted to give an example to your argument why did you feel the need to rope in us Gozitans. I would like to know what used to happen in similar circumstances in certain villages churches in Malta.
[Daphne – That’s a lie, L-Ghawdxi. The congregations in Gozo churches were DEFINITELY sorted with men on one side and women on the other. I remember this perfectly well because back in those days, round about 30 years ago, my friends and I still went to mass on Sundays and when we were in Gozo we would find this really peculiar. No, it didn’t happen in churches in Malta at that time.]
It happened in Malta in the 60s with the front benches marked “Nisa Biss” and the back benches for the men; first hand info, being a nipper at the time.
[Daphne – Malta in the 1960s? Well, definitely not in Sliema, I can tell you that for a fact.]
What did they do in churches where they had chairs instead of benches? Probably the same segregation took place; shades of Rosa Parks.
Well, Birkirkara for sure.
There was a church that had a very early mass: something like 4.30am.
Close by there was a bakery that had bread for sale around the same time as our end of partying gave us a huge appetite for an early breakfast.
It was a curious scene to watch, beautiful in its austerity since every single person approaching the church to join the congregation was dressed in black from head to toe, every time, and there were still many veils in evidence.
Even the approach to the church was separate and individual. The people in question were all old. One day in the late 90s my friends and I decided to check this point out, whether gender segregation was still practised, such as it was done more commonly during the 80s, even during masses taking place during the day.
To confirm, it was. There was, I recall clearly, a side for the men and a side for the women. I believe it was women on the right and men on the left.
I suspect l-Ghawdxi knows more about Gozo than you. In any case I do not recall that 30 years in Gozo there was such a separation between and women in the churches I visited. However I know this was the case both in Malta and Gozo in the more distant past.
[Daphne – The fact that somebody calls himself L-Ghawdxi doesn’t mean he is one, David. Nor does it mean that he is old enough to remember. I, on the other hand, remember clearly that men and women sat on different sides of the church in Gozo in the early 1980s, because I was in those churches and saw them. We even used to have discussions about whether we should ‘when in Rome etc’ and do as they did and split up, sitting on different sides of the aisle, or whether we should just sit together. I don’t know what they have done since then, and I don’t much care either.]
Given the way he was elected at the eleventh hour in a casual election, his place is really on the Opposition benches.
The Times (online) carries an article titled “Gonzi in strong reaction to appointment of new Speaker”.
Whilst I praise Gonzi for endless amount of good work which was carried out under his helm, I would have liked to see a strong Gonzi reigning in all the MPs and his close staff, and his advisers whose collective behaviour and advice somehow or other led to such an embarrassing defeat.
And that is Malta Taghna Ilkoll. They make mistakes by simple taking their seats.
The heading of this article should have been The State of This Parliament
No, Gozitans do not do that, at least not in the capital. They distinguish themselves more on city / village demeanour.
Such a partisan speech by the President (written by the government, ie Labour’s speech writers).
After such a rude awakening however, the PN MPS were very aware of where they had to go.
Sthajlitiex Jackie O dalghodu Mrs Muscat……….JFK he ain’t though
Still a kohlrabi then.
When the President began to read his deeply offensive speech, I thought he was delivering one of those ‘special guest’ speeches during the Malta Labour Party electoral campaign – one of which was incidentally delivered by his son.
http://sphotos-g.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/388764_512982915414099_1346221043_n.jpg
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2013-04-06/news/presidents-remarks-raise-the-eyebrows-1339817984/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=facebook
I heard part of the President’s speech at the opening of parliament …. sounded as though it was part of MLP’s electoral campaign
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/blog/2013/apr/06/banking-loophole-malta
They have been sitting there so comfortably in Opposition that some of them don’t want to give it up.
They are still thinking like in opposition.
Worse still, it seems that they think that they are still in the electoral campaign – see the President’s speech in Parliament yesterday.
It seems that while some weeks ago they invited the President’s son to their mass meeting, they now went one better and thought of inviting the President himself. What an insulting move to the political minority represented by the PN.
The new Speaker of the House has asked for a Kevlar shirt and bullet proof car just in case tables turn again.
id-diskors tal-President preparat mill-gvern kien qisu ta’ reporter tas-Super One. Ma jixraqx ghad-diskors mit-tron u huwa insult ghall-figura tal-President li jigi mgiel jaqra diskors daqshekk diviziv meta il-persuna tal-President innifisa titlob li tipromovi l-ghaqda.
Ghalhekk jew dan huma diskors li min kitbu huwa biss dilettant u ma jafx xi jfisser diskors mit-tron jew inkella tant hu arroganti li lanqas il-kariga ta’ President ma jikalkulaw u jghaddu minn fuqha qisu ma qed jigri xejn.
Allura jekk hija din ta’ l-ahhar ninsabu f’dittatura bla ma nafu.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20130406/local/pn-critical-of-political-slogans-in-president-s-address.464430
Lack of respect to 43% of the maltese population and to the government opting to choose him as President of (whole of) Malta.
Dr. Karmnu Vella from the ministry of Tourism, envisages a ” difficult ” year for the cruise liner industry in Malta.
I wonder why.
He ain’t no Dr.
Maybe he just meant that the future of cruise lining in Malta is no longer rosy, but orange?
That the Malta Labour Party had used Frankie Tabone, Jaffrey Pulcinell Orland and Jasmint ‘Manwel Dimech Bridge’ Mugliett to undermine the Nationalist Party considering their current state of mind was to some extent politically understandable – even if from an ethical point of view, it was fully within expectations knowing Labour’s moral standards.
But that Labour would use the ‘super-partes’ President of the Republic George Abela to insult a political minority in Parliament is too much. This is totally undemocratic and goes to show how low the Malta Labour Party of ‘Malta Taghna Lkoll’ can stoop.
This is a sign of how the Labour government of Malta deals with occassions of the State.
It shows how Labour, in its excesses, is even ready to expose the position of the President to disrespect.
It shows also the “what the hack” attitude towards the Republic which Labour says it wishes to reform.
The failure on the part of the President of the Republic to reject this speech also shows the common belief expressed often on this blog that ‘once a Laburist, always a Laburist.’
I read The Times’ report of George Abela’s speech at the state opening of parliament. I was skimming through and I initially thought that it had been Joseph Muscat speaking.
That speech was disgraceful. It was nothing but the last vengeful twist of the blade in the back of the man who made him what he is today. And this is a president who was widely thought to have brought an unprecedented level of reconciliation between the two sides.
Bollocks! I’ve been saying for years that George Abela has been the worst ever president of Malta. He is nothing but a charlatan. A backwater, backstabbing redneck who can only dream of possessing the gravitas of any of his predecessors (except possibly Agatha Barbara).
He has made a laughing stock of himself and, by extension, the presidency and the country since the very first days of his presidency.
What a truly disgusting little failure of a man.
Ah, but he collected more than 2 million euros for the Community Chest Fund on L-Istrina.
I hope someone has noticed that for all its bluster about progressive liberal secularism, the whole Labour bench plus hangers-on dutifully attended high mass.
Time for a low mass?
And it’s back!
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/04/05/mad-men-returns-a-recap-of-season-five.html
Anglu Farrugia on Dissett . Reno Bugeja struggling to make sense of his ramblings.
[Daphne – I missed it. I’ll watch it on the internet.]
Shades of Spiru Sant?
Is there a link, please?
Daphne if you missed Anglu on Dissett I can assure that you ain’t missed anything.