Ah, finally. Joseph Muscat is going to tell everyone how to run the Commonwealth

Published: July 5, 2014 at 1:40pm

LSE

Around two years ago, Lawrence Gonzi gave a well-attended public talk at the London School of Economics, on the subject of developments in the Mediterranean and the crisis in Libya.

Now Joseph Muscat, clearly feeling the need to compete, has engineered an invitation to do the same. His topic? How the Commonwealth should be run. Because, you know, the Commonwealth has been waiting around for instructions from precisely him.

Perhaps he should begin his speech by saying that almost nobody in Malta knows what the Commonwealth is or that Malta is part of it, and that supporters of his party are the least likely to know.




22 Comments Comment

  1. Someone says:

    Something tells me it won’t feature in TED Talks…

    http://www.ted.com/talks/browse

  2. wasn't me says:

    Diverse as ever our Jo, LSE to Us Weekly.

    http://www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/brad-pitt-angelina-jolie-to-film-new-movie-in-malta-get-the-details-201447

    No doubt a photo of the twins with Brangelina and their children is in the pipeline. Can’t wait.

    [Daphne – Who would have thought that Brad Pitt would age so badly that he would end up looking like Gary Glitter in Bangkok? His wife looks marvellous, though.]

    • Sister Ray says:

      Ha ha. Looks like he’s going the George Michael way.

    • Giovanni says:

      The Muscat twins will also spend some time playing with Brangelina’s children. Why? Mhux ovvja for a photo session ghall l-album.

  3. Paul says:

    He will be suggesting that they bend the rules a little bit and allow China to join the Commonwealth.

  4. Carolina says:

    I hope he will do well. This seems to be a teaching session and a learning experience. I will ask my children in London to make sure to attend. Maybe they will learn something.

    [Daphne – If your children are in London, Carolina, and if as you have said before they are academic specialists in their field, they don’t need the sudden advent of Joseph Muscat in their city to discover what the Commonwealth is and how it functions. They are probably more able to teach him. And no, Muscat is not there to teach. It is a public talk. He is there to speak, and he should do so in full knowledge that practically everyone in the audience is going to be of superior academic intelligence to his, which is why they are students at that particular university or teaching at it. A public talk at the London School of Economics is not a breakfast meeting for Maltese businessmen.]

    • La Redoute says:

      If your children are in London and receive instructions from their mother in Malta about how to soend their time, the appropriate response is to tell you where to shove it – especially if you ‘ask’ them to make sure they listed to a two-cent jerk reading off a speech written by someone else.

      I’d love to see how he’s going to wriggle out of awkward, unscripted questions.

    • H.P. Baxxter says:

      Are your children also fair, tall and broad-shouldered?

  5. observer says:

    I hope he will not put too much emphasis on the fact that a fairly sizeable portion of the Commonwealth (round about 380 to 390 million) is made up of black people living in Africa.

    And he must not forget his ‘pushback’ policy on unfortunates escaping from war, famine, drought or slavery existing in some of the countries there.

    He does have considerable cheek to tell others how to run their thing. And that cheek will surely not fail him at the LSE.

  6. bob-a-job says:

    He’ll be explaining how he’s selling Malta’s common wealth to the Chinese at rock bottom prices, not excluding passports.

  7. George Grech says:

    Who will be writing it for him ? Will he carry his podium and teleprompter with him ?

    • curious says:

      I suspect that Mario ‘Watersbroken’ Vella is writing a couple of speeches for him.

      • It-Tezi ta' Mario says:

        Apparently, when Muscat spoke on stage in China last September at the same meeting where he announced the underhand scheme to sell EU passports, Mario Vella sat in the audience frantically pecking away at his smartphone screen to prompt Muscat when his bravado flagged.

      • ciccio says:

        Then one should expect the speech to start with words like:

        “In the manner of philosophy, which, in the words of Hegel, like the owl of Minerva takes flight at dusk, at the end of a civilisation’s highest moment, this study begins with an investigation of a phenomenon that emerges, globally and historically, at the end of Fordist epoch of capitalism, or, at least, at a time of Fordism in crisis.”

        http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2013/03/heres-a-bit-from-joseph-muscats-doctoral-thesis-in-the-distinctive-style-of-mario-vella/

      • Chris Ripard says:

        Could be. At least he’s stopped boring us with his interminable moans at PN’s bad government (sic).

  8. Kif inhi din? says:

    The Prime Minister is going to warn black African leaders of Commonwealth countries that if they don’t burden-share on immigration, he is going to make them smell the coffee.

  9. Libertas says:

    He should tell them how the Commonwealth should NOT be run, with examples of his ideology in action: amoral politics i.e. għall-voti nagħmel kollox reflecting the prevalent ideology of people in Malta, amoral familism i.e. għall-familja nagħmel kollox.

  10. During the days when the MLP was in government between 1971 and 1987 the Maltese government hardly showed any interest in the Commonwealth. Some MLP supporter may wish to enlighten us how many Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings (CHOGM), held every two years, were attended by the Maltese prime minister during that period.

  11. P Shaw says:

    Will Phyllis Muscat write his speech?

  12. We are living in Financial Times says:

    One wonders just how much backing Nair and his team have provided.

    One also wonders whether influential newspapers in London are pushing the Nair agenda.

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