Gosh, he’s a natural with children, isn’t he? You can just picture him, can’t you, rolling on the floor with his own, who are that age
You’d never believe by looking at this photograph that the National Security Minister has some children of his own who are just that age.
You’d assume that if he did, he wouldn’t be standing there looking like one of Captain Cook’s men, offering a bag of beads to some cautiously advancing natives on a South Sea island.
Manuel Mallia, despite being the father of small children, seems to actually believe that what all small children really, really want is fruit. Lots of it. And what’s more, fruit all wrapped up securely in that tough cellophane so they can’t get at it unless they’re allowed to run about with scissors.
And Manuel Mallia being Manuel Mallia, one of the stingiest men in Malta whose nanny was dispatched to the Mainguard fountain every day with a double-buggy full of jerry-cans to fill for the Mallia household (that is neither a lie nor an exaggeration, but a fact), didn’t even buy the fruit himself.
It was bought by a Muslim community group and he stole their thunder.
Do the Mallia children have any toys at home? They must play with fruit.
Children that age hate fruit, Mr Minister. They have to be badgered and bribed into eating it. When a voluntary organisation buys fruit for children in care, or similar, it’s given to the adults who will have the thankless task of persuading the children to eat it before it rots.
Here’s another word of advice about something that should come naturally to you as a father yourself, but clearly does not, Mr Minister: it is wrong and hurtful to children to raise their expectations about receiving something special, especially when they are children so deprived, only to present them with a cellophane packet of something as exciting to a child as a pair of socks. Worse, in fact, because nobody is going to force them to eat socks.
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Captain Cook? More like one of Captain Hook’s men.
Good morning. I recently started reading your blog and I must admit that I am spending too much time checking for any new additions :). You write well, Ms Daphne, and you have some smart followers indeed.
You hit the nail with this article and the picture says it all….yes, in my opinion it was a real anti-climax for those kids, probably dressed in their best clothes waiting eagerly for this important man who will be giving out some presents.
Keep up the good writing. You have guts, lady. Not many can say or write what’s really and truly on their mind. Thank you.
If their compatriots who are locked in Hal Kirkop protest, would he send them a truckload of soldiers to control them, or truckloads of fruit? Would he let in the media?
Hello Daphne,
I would appreciate if you could give us your e-mail address.
Thanks
[Daphne – [email protected]]
A fruit salad should have been made and served in small plastic containers for the children. You can find thousands of fruit salad recipes that can please children. But the Minister thinks more about the prisoners than about small children..
nail on the head :)
The wolf and the lambs.
Apart from other considerations, I find this public display of ‘charity’ to be in poor taste – giving food to the poor. Especially when the minister’s speech was anything but welcoming to “those of a colour unlike ours”, as I’ve heard some people on radio refer to Africans.
As reported in the papers, the minister did not reassure immigrants that they were safe in Malta but admonished them that they have to accept our customs and traditions. And of course there was the usual rant against the EU for not taking them off our backs.
I did not hear his speech, but if that is what he said, then we’re all really heading for the gutter.
If anyone was looking for an impeccable and unequivocal pictorial definition of “pastaz”, here you have it.
One more election campaign promise kept: Labour delivers. In this case, fruit.
The intention is good but the message is wrong; for example it would have been a better idea if children of different ethnicity were seen giving and maybe eating fruit (sending out the message ‘look children fruit is good’, playing together, sharing, giving toys, interacting…. children have a natural way of interacting together prejudice free.
This would show that ultimately we really are all the same; black or white, rich or poor, and would also show that the government is ready to prepare the Maltese population for a reality they are not ready, and worse not prepared to accept. The message would have had been even better if the children were off-springs of people in government.
The look of disappointment on the children’s faces says it all.
Mr Minister , Jesus taught us that as far as charity is concerned, do not let the right hand know what the left hand is doing.
I am sure that those kiddies would have preferred boxes full of ice lollies and granita in this heat, and free tickets to some water park.
Those poor children know they shouldn’t accept gifts from a strange man.
Watch out, kids. Santa’s coming with goodies.
“Was that really Santa, mummy? Why no bell and white beard?”
“Don’t worry, little one. What counts is the thought – and the girth, of course”
I suppose we should be thankful the minister didn’t present them with bunches of bananas. It’s the party Norman Lowell voted for, after all.
Are you for real?
I don’t suppose you roll on the floor playing with your children you sophisticated person that you are.
[Daphne – Dennis, my children are grown men in their mid and late 20s. Do you think it appropriate that I should roll on the floor with them? We don’t all run around reproducing in our old age, you know. When I am the Minister of National Security’s age, my children will be in their 40s, not at kindergarten.]
How nice to know that your writings keep helping to keep JM in power for a longggggg time
Thank you keep it up, you are our secret campagainer
[Daphne – How infinitely childish you are. Not to be offensive or anything, but it really doesn’t surprise me that you voted for this rubbish. Your thought processes and ability to assess information are seriously deficient. Also, you are frozen in time. You and your people have been insulting me for so long that you haven’t stopped to realise that a quarter of a century has gone by, and ding dong, my ‘children’ are now the age I was then. Wake up, fool.]
Actually, it’s the people with some brain cells who will appreciate Daphne’s observations – it’s people who are blinkered, petty and unable to call a spade a spade who can’t do otherwise!