GUEST POST: On secrecy and the mini-revolt in Labour’s parliamentary group
This piece has been written as a guest post.
During committee stage in parliament on the citizenship-for-sale law, the Opposition lodged many amendments, one of which was to retain the obligation to publish, every three months in the Government Gazette, the names of all those who acquire Maltese citizenship. The government insisted on keeping things the way it wanted them – secret – and scrapped the obligation to publish.
When it came to voting on the Opposition’s proposal that publication of names should continue to be mandatory, Louis Grech and Joseph Muscat both voted against. Then, after just six days, in a telephone conversation from Sri Lanka with his deputy Grech, Muscat made a roundabout turn. They had just voted for secrecy, the president had signed the legislation off, and then they suddenly changed their minds.
That’s the state of our parliamentary democracy under Labour, after 50 years of independence and 40 years of a settled Constitution.
What happened was due mostly to this website after it became the only medium which showed just how badly Muscat’s citizenship-for-sale scheme has been received throughout the world.
What has ensued is a mini-revolt in the Labour parliamentary group, many of whom are saying privately that they are against the scheme. They won’t say it publicly as Marlene Farrugia did (and then voted for it all the same). They won’t tell Muscat, either (government jobs for its backbench have precisely this effect) – but they would confide in Louis Grech.
Alfred Sant’s ‘no comment’ to The Malta Independent is also very telling in this regard. If he agrees with this scheme to sell Maltese citizenship, then he would have had no problem at all saying so. That he failed to speak indicates that he does not agree with it, but doesn’t wish to make an issue of it.
The problem with Muscat is that many of his own parliamentary group and the public at large are against the entire scheme. The secrecy clause was only a symptom of what is fundamentally wrong with Muscat: that he thinks everyone and everything has a price and can be bought and sold.
When Joseph Muscat has been faced with the business of real government and decision-making, not just making pre-electoral promises or buying off his critics (including large parts of the supposedly ‘independent’ press), he has been found seriously wanting, and he is now in panic.
The citizenship-for-sale bill has to be opposed, because pressure works. When amendments to a bill are announced on the very day the President signs it into law, when these same amendments were rejected only six days earlier by the very same people saying they have now ‘listened’, you know what kind of government we have.
You also know that large parts of what purport to be the independent media in Malta have become useless at performing one of the most basic functions in a country that takes itself seriously – to be very, very sceptical of government – though strangely they were very good at it when inspired by wall-clocks, Franco Debono’s tantrums and Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando’s Facebook page.
Unlike the world media (and The Malta Independent) which immediately grasped the fundamentals at issue, picked up the story and ran with it, our supposedly independent press missed what is so obviously wrong with citizenship for sale.
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Joseph Muscat has to be careful not to play dirty tricks with the amendment of the secrecy clause. Many European ountries and non-European will be watching him.
“Ikkampanjajna bhala Moviment, u ser nidhlu gass down gol-hajt bhala Moviment.”
Did Joseph Muscat change his mind on clause 25? Did he phone Louis Grech from Sri Lanka or did the government change its mind in Joseph Muscat’s absence?
He didn’t change his mind. He was forced to do something to calm the waters for a while.
Maybe the police commissioner can Investigate who called who first.
Muscat didn’t change his mind. He has bought himself enough time to sneak in the 50-60 new citizens he said are already lined up. Under the current law, their names needn’t be published.
The criteria for the due diligence tests haven’t been finalised yet, so we can safely assume that these 50-60 applicants will not be subjected to any sort of test.
Totally right.The promised land has been given to those that were on the initial list . These will have their citizenship under the black cloak and we will never find out who they are unless caught out by European Passport control.
It takes parliament, not government action, to remove the secrecy clause.
So when is it going to be discussed, or more importantly, is it going to be discussed?
Or has Joseph Muscat done what he usually does and lied in the hope that people will think that once he said it, it is true?
I trust that the press will pick this up and follow it through.
As for all the other Labour parliamentarians, miskom tisthu, imbasta hafna paroli, imbaghad thallu qrempucc jwaqghakom ghan-nejk
Mini-revolt or not they are all accomplices. They all voted for it. It’s not just the Prime Minister now. They are all disgusting amateurs, arrogant, and visionless. This is gass down gol-hajt worse than expected.
I just do not believe anything of what they are now saying.
The law is as it is now, signed off by the president, complete with the secrecy clause.
I would tend to agree.
I think Marlene’s statement of being against it but voting for it none the less was an emotive statement made to stir up some sort of sense of duty towards Muscat and show those who were actually against it that there is a way of reconciling your opinion about the whole scheme with voting in favour of it anyway.
In other words it was bullshit.
Daphne were you ”skeptical of government” before or you ALWAYS praised it to high heavens ?
This country is pathetic ,even the supposedly intelligent ones.
[Daphne – You are quite obviously not a regular reader.]