China is going to be big in our lives
The opening paragraphs of my column in The Malta Independent on Sunday, today – you can read the rest of it via the link below:
You know how they say ‘follow the money’? Nobody has even begun to do that in respect of the ever-increasing presence of China on the government’s agenda. Malta’s forced march down this particular road indicates that somebody, somewhere, is likely to be getting something, and it’s not necessarily a straightforward commission on a deal.
But even if it were legal commission on a legal deal, we should know, so as to be able to put matters into context. That the government has shrouded, is shrouding, its Big Chinese Affair in secrecy is not only insulting to those who elected it (the rest of us expected just this sort of thing to happen), it is wrong and undemocratic. It is also extremely hypocritical because these, after all, are the politicians who very cynically made so much fuss about the BWSC power station contract and, at the lowest end of the sliding scale, the finance minister’s clock.
I think we might well find out, when it’s far too late, that clocks did not swing this. But if we find out at all, we should be glad. It is too easy to keep matters of this nature concealed for ever because hard proof is hard to come by and all journalists and electors are left with is their suspicions.
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http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2013-06-23/opinions/china-is-going-to-be-big-in-our-lives-1891467264/
So will be Libya.
Skont l-ahbarijiet ta’ TVM, ikkwotaw lil Muscat dwar il-laqgha tieghu fil-Libya, ”Gejna ghand il-bieb u sibna il-bieb miftuh”
Qisu ffissat mal-bibien, bejn jaghmel podiums quddiem l-bieb ta’ Kastilja u frazi bhal din.
Lets not forget the University.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20130605/local/Stronger-links-forged-in-Malta-China-education.472577
Beijing’s man in Malta has just been appointed on the University Council.
Who?
He’s referring to Reno Calleja. Here’s the full list:
http://www.um.edu.mt/about/uom/administration/council
Don’t get me started. Why don’t we set up a Flat Earth Department and a Faculty of Druids while we’re at it.
To such depths has Juanito Camilleri, once touted as a forward-looking genius, sunk. And if it’s the government that’s forces his hand, we then damn it, he should have resigned. Charlatanism and false science in a university is a resignation matter.
But then again most Maltese probably think the Earth rests on the back of three tortoises so let’s all smile and shake hands.
I thought it was four elephants that stood on the back of a giant turtle.
It was a pity, that as usual, under this socialist government, science is forgotten.
The university, the education minister and that moron sitting on the left of sister Bartolo, should have approached the Chinese life science sector, that is growing and is ready to expand. But life science is not as nationalistic as the teaching of a language spoken by about 400,000 people such as Maltese and Luxembourgese.
Don’t go off on a tangent, Mercury. I’m talking about the University of Malta setting up a institute of Chinese traditional medicine.
The Medical Council, the Faculty of Medicine, all our medical doctors, all our other doctors, Juanito Camilleri, all University Council members, and all our soi-disant scientists are a bunch of spineless arse-licking jellyfish.
I agree Baxxter. It’s a throwback to the middle ages! In this day and age we should have laws in place identifying that these alternative therapies (homeopathy, traditional medicine, holistic approaches etc) have no therapeutic effect and have been shown by peer-reviewed scientific investigations to basically be one big fraud.
It has worried me no end as a healthcare professional and a scientist to see Malta start to slip down the slippery slope of alternative medicine. The authorities (including the medical and pharmacy councils) need to wake from their slumber and approach this threat to Maltese healthcare
Are you a healthcare professional? Then for the love of god speak up. Get out there. Stir up a shitstorm. You’ll find that some of your colleagues will join you until you reach a critical mass.
This is a decision which shames the University of Malta.
It is an insult to the Themistocles Zammit after whom the aula magna at the Msida campus was named. It is an insult to Albert Fenech, who is now an MP, and who certainly can and should speak out. Chinese medicine has no place in an institute that teaches the scientific method.
It saddens me to say that Juanito Camilleri is no better than the rest of them.
Juanito Camilleri has been working hard to forge links with Chinese institutions for several years now. This is not something that has sprouted since March 9.
I know. But it’s one thing to let the Chinese set up an institute of genetics and another one to set up an institute of traditional Chinese medicine. It’s science vs quackery.
But hey, kullhadd ghandu dritt isemma’ lehnu, u forsi Bakkster jemmen li t-trab tal-penis imqadded tad-dragun tal-Manchuria se jfejjaqlu l-kanser, mela ghandu ragun daqs il-professuri tal-Medical Council.
We have seen so many delegations over the years, going to Libya and soon after nicely worded declarations that mean fu*k all. Next thing we know is that the Ministers were changed after a week and talks have to start all over again.
Daphne has reinforced my well-founded suspicions about this MLP/Communist Party agreement.
I suspect someone bankrolled the head of a small political party.
Is it true that Labour had a group of ‘students’ mentored by AST studying Chinese or Mongolian?
Like Mintoff before him Muscat has to be propped up by a dictatorial regime.
In the last ten years PN governments have also relied on financial assistance but from the EU, not Libya or China.
There’s a big difference.
To gain influence in the EU and the Mediterranean region, China sees MLP as a good bet to develop a special relationship. I wouldn’t be surprised if over the years they financed the MLP.
Now it is pay back time for the communist China. They will be rewarded with the bridge and with the power station.
Silly. Payback time is when China gets the political leverage it bought by bankrolling Muscat’s ambitions. For China, a Eur4 million study is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Ditto building and supplying a gas-driven power station, and Malta’s 25-year obligation to buy its output.
Excellent article.
Business with China should be encouraged and cannot be held back, after all, China has the second largest economy in the world, but there certainly is something fishy going on. Labour has a long history of cutting deals with undemocratic governments.
Joseph Muscat justified accepting free Chinese consultation by saying that you cannot say no to or over-scrutinise anything which comes for free.
That explains why Labour never worried or felt ashamed about the blood money used by Gaddafi to plug our financial gaps.
We gave up Gaddafi, cut ties with North Korea and joined the EU only to end up with China as our overlords. Truly unbelievable.
It’s perfectly believable. Labour’s shadiness is fathomless.
Daphne, you blocked this comment earlier this week. However, I repeat, ‘The yellow horde cometh’.
[Daphne – That’s a racist remark, Harry, which is why I blocked it. Now I have to reply to tell you why I blocked it.]
The chink in his armour.
“The Middle Kingdom cometh” then. Is that racist?
There was no racist intent, Daphne. I have some very close Chinese friends in both Canada and Switzerland.
However, as you made quite clear in your article, something smells here.
“Some of my best friends are gay”
Duh, good for you, La Redoute.
Wasn’t there, at one time, a quota for the number of Chinese given visas for Malta? Does this still exist? Has it been revised upwards?
Was it this ‘quota’ which gave rise to the visa-scandal some years back?
I’m glad you picked up on this too. Around the day of the election Chinese ships were seen in the harbour.
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20130326/local/chinese-navy-ships-arrive.462962
Many friends and acquaintances of mine are convinced that China has been funding the Labour Party all this time, that China will be building our power station and owning it in whole or in part (since they are the only people on this planet able to build such a power station in less than 2 years) and that in return Malta will be their eyes and ears in the EU.
It is also significant that the power station has become an issue.
The power station has often been an issue with the Labour Party. I always suspected that it was being used almost deliberately because of the place it holds in the minds of many Maltese people.
Incidentally, there are many documents on Wikileaks that talk of the very same evasive words Muscat is using these days. “Other companies short listed” or “other things were discussed” etc. but never saying exactly what. Of course in those cables they were talking about Mintoff.
I’ll try and find these cables when I have the time and post them on here. Muscat doesn’t just sound like Mintoff, he most definitely is becoming Mintoff, with none of the charisma and all of the malice.
Here is one:
http://www.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1974VALLET01649_b.html
And all those with some time to kill can check out all the cables about Mintoff in the link below.
They include many details including how the Labour Party had come up with the fairy tale that some UK MP wanted to bribe some Maltese MP and how there was some sort of assassination plot, all of which was not true, and how he lied about his health after he had fallen off a horse and seriously injured his head, went abroad for health care, and lied about it to the public, and how no one in Malta was allowed to visit any foreign diplomat without permission and reporting back to Mintoff anything that was said.
http://search.wikileaks.org/plusd/?q=&qftags=MINTOFF%2C+DOMINIC#result
Eyes and ears? That’s the least of it. Gaddafi pulled Malta’s strings for years. Now it’s China’s turn.
We were Libya’s whore, now we are about to become China’s whore. Mit-tajjeb ghall-ahjar.
Over the next five years, Joseph Muscat will be gradually selling us to China, in return for free feasibility studies, cheap ‘made in china’ bridges, and a gas power plant which we will not own.
Before the end of the legislature, we will become Chinese territory controlled from Beijing. Little Joey will become an Emperor and the Muscat dynasty will become established as the family to rule Malta for centuries to come.
Malta, which Labour once wanted to turn into a Svizzera tal-Mediterran, will become a Taiwan tal-Mediterran.
Oh come now. It’s not as if the Chinese takeover started with Labour. The PN has been grovelling to China for the best part of thirty years.
And you know what, they will all start shouting ” What’s wrong with Taiwan?” like any objection to it would be a mystery to them.
If it wasn’t for the fact that the average Chinese worker is fobbed off with a bowl of rice and a pat on the head for his 16 hour shift, we wouldn’t be knee-deep in electrical goodies. I hope China does get democracy one day but then the prices will rocket.
Good. Then our home-grown morons will focus on what really matters.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/128130324/Joseph-Muscat-says-he-signed-an-agreement-with-China-on-Malta-s-behalf-it-Torca-18APR2010
China has been buying up tinpot African dictatorships for years, using exactly these same methods. The difference is that with them it wants preferential access to their natural resources and with us it wants a voice at the EU council when external trade is being discussed and votes cast.
Still, there’s a golden opportunity for Joey to backtrack on this power station folly and blame it on the PN and the EU.
All he has to do is award the contract to the Chinese bidder.
Then all hell will break loose, in the local courts and EU circles.
The Labour man in the street might not be disturbed by the fact that we have a company giving us free stuff, whilst it’s sister company from the same stable is bidding for a major contract, but you can rest assured that the remaining bidders, with their experience of the workings of the energy industry, will be substantially more disturbed than that.
Who says the power station contract hasn’t been awarded to a Chinese company?
The Times’ article regarding the expressions of interest in Casinos in Gozo does not mention the four companies registering their intent (see: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20130624/local/four-companies-show-interest-in-gozo-casino-licence.475210).
I wonder whether any and, if so, which of these companies have Chinese, Saudi, or Libyan backing.
Has someone been selected to front or pitch Chinese investment in Libya and in Saudi?
Are the Chinese going to be awarded an agreement re the extraction of gas from Maltese territorial waters?
With Gaddafi the agreement was regarding oil extraction, what are the Chinese gaining and the question to ask is who is pocketing the intermediary commissions?