Looks like they’re all at it – two months in and the prime minister has no control
The Times reports that the foreign minister (a doctor) is still seeing patients. He joins the health minister, also a doctor, and the parliamentary secretary for old people, an eye surgeon.
And those are the ones we know about.
Meanwhile, the parliamentary secretary for culture makes crucial appointments without getting prior approval from the boss, and then tells us that he consulted him.
In all cases, the prime minister is forced into a situation where he has to justify – and pretend it was his idea – the fait accompli with which he was presented.
And he is not in a position to talk, anyway, because of his own wayward decisions, including paying himself to use his own car.
Two months in, and it is apparent that Muscat cannot exert authority over his people. After staying to heel just long enough to win the election, they have immediately begun going AWOL.
His massive victory has actually worked against him. His men and women feel comfortable enough to throw their weight around and even to ignore him.
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http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20130507/local/Foreign-Minister-is-still-seeing-patients-at-clinic.468664
Small wonder they don’t require the offices adjacent to the Parliament House.
They all plan to continue seeing their constituents in their clinics and private offices.
Il-gvern-taghna-naghmlu-li rridu-mentality.
Typically Labour.
This comfortable majority is going to boomerang just like the one-seat majority that the PN had.
Debono and Pullicino Orlando could blackmail their party because of the wafer thin majority and now the PL MPs can disobey as much as they like without any grave consequences to the stability of the government.
I am not sure which scenario is the worse.
Do you mean he will understand the extent he has been used by the rest?
I don’t blame them. We are all starving and the cabinet is so big that there isn’t money to pay them all properly.
It was always quite obviously going to end like this. The picture of power-hungry dinosaurs bowing to the new kid on the block, straight out of the Super One newsroom, was not a natural one.
It is working out as an inverse of a one seat majority – only diff is that the country suffers and not the party .
Joseph has delegated ALL responsibilities, except tape-cutting and marble-plaque uncovering.
He does not want to be bothered and his goons know it.
The free-for-all has started and can only gather speed.
The result will look like a rattlesnake cove, lots of noise and no body and wants to go in.
You forgot the looting of our coffers.
The next thing which I’m expecting to happen is seeing Jose’ Herrera as minister in a self-leased BMW.
Too true. Joseph got what he wanted – being the Prime Minister of Malta and now just wants to lord it over everyone whilst letting the goons do what they want.
Strange how no one is filling the timesofmalta comments board on what the present government is doing that is not quite right. Apathy at its best or rather hiding what is really happening.
They had a whale of a time during the PN government criticising it, speaking of corruption etc. etc. but it seems that now everything is just dandy. Hypocrites.
If their pay isn’t that great, they might want to think about increasing it by around 500 euros a week.
That way they can quit their day job and work professionally and we can all look at them and say “We told you so”, while Labour’s famous hindsight starts to kick in.
A useful link for the Foreign Minister, just in case he doesn’t know the word’s meaning:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/resign
It is becoming clearer by the day that the running of the country will be a free-for-all.
People like George Vella, Herrera and Mercieca will most certainly not be subservient to a slimy moron like Joey.
He had the cheek to employ his car and his wife.
They will do what the hell they like
There will be many more of these loose cannon as the weeks tick by.
Mark my word.
Spot on, Anthony.
In Maltese we say: ‘L-ezempju jkaxkar’. How true.
I wonder, was he doing the same in 1996-98? I don’t remember any such issue being mentioned back then.
Foreign Minister hasn’t much to do.
Foreign Minister can visit Libya to forge new ties with new democratic, Islamist friends, and perhaps knit socks and gloves too.
Foreign Minister can also visit Cyprus Foreign Minister, miskin, to reminisce about what used to be ‘foreign affairs’ prior to EU membership and Cathy Ashton.
Kif jghidu, a diehes a day keeps the good doctor on pay.
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2013-05-07/news/joe-cassar-lambasts-medias-honeymoon-period-1543208961/
Too bad well-spoken gentlemen and professionals like Dr. Cassar are so hard to come by in these ‘honeymoon’ days of Labour government. Hopefully more people like him will continue to do their work and try to appeal to people’s common sense and call a spade a spade (irrespective of the apparently complacent media).
It’s one thing having a slick election campaign; managing people in your government requires more skill.
These mavericks are of the same ilk as Jeffrey and Franco and people without principles are capable of anything.
The Prime Minister did after all unilaterally modify the code of ethics about ministers giving up their day job. That was effectively a licence for anarchy.
Sadly, if you start off with a fake Dolce and Gabbana dress, it’s bound to fall apart at the seams at some point.
During the electoral campaign he had absolute power over them. They were at his mercy and he could control everything, even how they kept their facial hair.
Now they have constitutional powers. He can’t do much to stop them (without repercussions for the party).
This brings up a personal dilemma: On the one hand, I’d like the damage caused to the country to be minimal, but on the other, I’d really like to see this situation leading to the PL imploding.
Mayhem…a total mess.
I am getting the feeling that the cabinet will soon come apart.
Some ministers will give up and resign, while others will succumb to a breakdown because of work pressures for which they never prepared themselves over the past 26 years, and begin (or carry on) crying in public.
I suggested earlier on in this legislature that Joseph Muscat was trying to avoid attacks on his government by anyone left outside from his camp, so he tried to include everyone. Hence his mega-cabinet of 24 ministers, numerous consultants, committees, commissions, conventions and boards.
But this means that the trouble has been internalised, and the wars will start inside – hence my quip about the “war cabinet.”
By their nature, human beings are always yearning for what they do not have.
I have this feeling that Dr. Vella has no excitement to spend his time travelling around the globe – but not in the EU – as a foreign affairs minister. He would probably rather earn a very decent living from serving patients in a small private clinic in Zejtun, while opposing a Nationalist government on his pet subject, the EU.
And how about Hose Herrera. Would anyone not believe that he would rather be in opposition criticising the government about the justice sector and holding meetings with the judges to discuss their work conditions and remuneration, rather than be humiliated by a 39 year-old PRIME Minister who appointed him as a JUNIOR Minister (when it is the 39 year old who should be the Junior Minister) for Culture, where he has to deal with Jason Micallef on a daily basis in order to spite Joseph Muscat, and where he has to attend GhanaFests on a Sunday to listen to Nordai, a 7 year old child who has been ‘programmed’ to sing socialist themes?
Ghamel update, ciccio, dear.
George Vella has been a europhile for the past decade. Euroscepticism hardly survives in Malta. We are officially the most europhile member state.
Not that I ever expected otherwise from this Nejxin of Cindinz: a gullible, lackey nation with no semblance of a critical mind. Merhla moghoz tigri wara s-silla tal-hmir.
Truly gullible … as the results of the last election prove.
Joseph promised a lot of smoke and mirrors and too many got taken in (sometimes not just due to their gullibility, but due to their envy, spite …).
And now that he is showing his true colours they want to give him a chance!
The other one must be Zammit Lewis. There is no way the queues outside his office are just people asking for favours.
Two months down the line and they have not abated.
Management by crisis, or management by popular vote.
I expect that for a good number of decisions, we will be fed some information to gauge the mood and if the water is calm he will continue, if not make a U turn as if nothing ever happened. This is not the way a proper leader should manage, but that is the stuff that Joseph Muscat is made of.
‘No we are not taking an extra 500euros per week BUT we are keeping our old jobs’ – Made in Malta Product :)
Someone should do a “100 days after” feature to get everyone up to speed on whats going on, just like they did their fictionalised version, only ours will be true
http://www.taghnalkoll.com/?p=609
Slightly off topic, but how does an MD become foreign minister, exactly?
Dr Vella pastaz u arroganti kont, ghadek u tibqa.
And to pay for the huge cabinet they will soon be dipping in our pockets. It has already started with the Police Force, no more extra duty at Mater Dei Hospital, then it will be prison officers as soon as the new lot is employed, no more overtime.
Nurses off with the constant watch and I’m sure there are plenty more of the same decisions to come.
Vote Labour, get Labour.
Let’s face it, Labour would have won the election by a landslide if a chimpanzee had been at the helm.
I guess we are now starting to see the results of just that.
I LOVE saying ‘I told you so’.
Somewhere amongst my comments (ages ago) you will find one to the effect that the sharks in the PL will run rings around Joseph Muscat.
Daphne was right all along. I am proud to say I listened to her and voted PN.
If they got Andreotti’s name wrong on the press release, what guarantee do we have that Minister Vella got it right in the Letter of Condolences proper?
http://gov.mt/en/Government/Press%20Releases/Pages/2013/May/08/pr0922.aspx
Here is the irony- The PN became unpopular for doing many things to advance the nation forward, while the MLP is increasing becoming unpopular for doing nothing, other than promoting their unqualified people to positions where the Maltese tax payer has to pay their generous salaries.
The Maltese mind befuddles me.