It was Joseph Muscat and Manuel Mallia who ‘hid’ the Valenzia report and not Carm Mifsud Bonnici and PM Gonzi
Muscat and Mallia (the army minister) hid the Valenzia report on how a migrant was killed by two soldiers for almost two years. It is significant, I think, that the report has only been published now that Mallia is no longer army minister, and retaliation cannot be the only reason.
The Valenzia report into the death – murder, actually – of an African migrant by two soldiers in the back of a detention van was completed two years ago, just before the country went into an election campaign. For one year and nine months of those two years, it has been kept concealed by Prime Minister Muscat and his Police and Army Minister Manuel Mallia.
THEY are the ones who refused to publish it.
Then a couple of days ago, when the prime minister had been forced to let Mallia go, he lashed out by giving the Valenzia report to his friend Ariadne Massa at Times of Malta, who published it. He also placed it on the table of the House. This was his way of getting back at the Opposition and trying to take public discussion down another route that damaged the Opposition and away from the ongoing route that is damaging him and his government.
It didn’t work. The backlash was instantaneous. All people of goodwill instantly dismissed as completely disgusting the fact that the prime minister saw a report with such serious implications as nothing but a weapon with which to injure his opponents. He held onto it for almost two years, did nothing about it, then made it public only now to serve his own narrow, personal vindictive and retaliatory interests, and not because he is concerned about the contents.
If Muscat were concerned about how conditions in the detention camps are described in the Valenzia report, he would have done something about it. But he didn’t. Instead – and this point cannot be underlined enough – he and his sordid, corrupt Police Minister made a point of trying to violate human rights law by pushing recently-landed immigrants back to Libya. They were stopped only when many lawyers took the initiative of banding together and filing a judicial protest in Malta’s Courts of Justice, which other lawyers then followed up by seeking and obtaining an injunction against the government from the European Court of Human Rights.
Now Aditus, Integra, the Jesuit Refugee Service, KOPIN, the Malta Emigrants’ Commission, the Migrant’s Network for Equality, the Organisation for Friendship and SOS Malta have issued a statement saying: “We cannot hesitate to express a serious condemnation of every single person who read this report, failed to act and chose to remain silent.”
For the last one year and nine months, that includes most prominently the prime minister and his man Manuel Mallia.
There’s another significant detail – not quite a detail – we’re missing in this debate. The prime minister only released the report when Manuel Mallia had been replaced as army minister. He might not have done it only in retaliation against the Opposition (though clearly that, too) but also because it was Mallia the army minister who had vetoed its publication before now – and as we have seen, he controlled the prime minister and not the other way round.
Manuel Mallia has a fondness for jackboots. He might have had ways of coming to terms with the fact that a blow to the groin by one of those jackboots killed a man in terrible agony. Let’s face it, Mallia and his subordinate Muscat had no conscience about pushing men back to Libya to face torture and death, and it took a European Court of Human Rights ruling to stop them, not a crisis of conscience.
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Oh but he got more of those. From ara x’ghamiltu to gejja tieghek.
If this isn’t vile.
Malta’s SS. Heil Shitter.
Let Joseph Muscat keep up this approach. He is a melting snowman.
In the eighties, when I was in my early teens, my father used to say, “Ahjar bicca hobz taht in-Nazzjonalisti milli l-laham taht daz-zibel”.
Unfortunately I still have to say the same to my own children.
If Gonzi’s government had applied Muscat’s push-back policy instead of saving human beings from certain death, then the Valenzia report would not have been necessary, because there would have been no immigrants to murder.
Joseph Muscat is an amoral hypocrite, and the lives of human beings are the last thing on his list of priorities.
The immigration tragedy is continuing unabated in the Mediterranean but without Malta’s intervention.
During Gonzi’s time humans were continuously saved from certain death by our dedicated Armed Forces members. Those days are gone, on Muscat’s instructions.
Most probably he was keeping it until election time but he was reaching a wall so he had to take out something.
We would also like for the prime minister to publish the reports about what happened that day last year those 400 migrants died at sea. I think those were 399 more deaths than the one he is trying to use.
The behaviour of the PM in utilising this report as a weapon for personal vindictiveness is utterly reprehensible.
In fact, in any democratic country, it would be considered as resignation material.
“This was a vendetta” – Arnold Cassola during Xarabank
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-12-13/local-news/PM-s-timing-of-detention-centre-inquiry-report-conclusions-a-vendetta-Cassola-says-6736127251
Who knows, maybe it would have seen the light of day only a couple of weeks before the next general election. In their way of thinking, the oil scandal worked, this will work as well.
What was she wearing?
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141213/local/remain-in-contact-with-the-natural-environment-president-appeals.548064
By releasing the report and hoping to hit Carm Mifsud Bonnici and the PN with it, Muscat is merely confirming to all and sundry that he has no idea about the principles of justice.
When the preliminary findings of the report were published in 2012 together with a plan to reform the detention services, it was also explained that the report would be passed on to the police authorities to be used in the prosecution of the two soldiers who would meanwhile be suspended from duty.
Dismissing them there and then would have potentially compromised the case against them since for all intents and purposes they are innocent until proven guilty. Their dismissal would have been been an effective punishment before they are found guilty.
By withholding the entire contents of the report and stopping the Commander of the Detention Services from firing the two soldiers, Carm Mifsud Bonnici was effectively protecting the investigation into the murder, not covering it up.
It’s astonishing that certain sections of the media swallowed Muscat’s bait hook, line and sinker.
[Daphne – Well, I can’t agree with you there at all. Employers do not need to wait until employees are proven guilty in a court of law before firing them for misbehaviour, let alone gross misbehaviour. The relationship between the state and the individual in terms of a murder is completely different and separate to the relationship between the employer and the employee who has committed the murder.
The fact remains that those two soldiers were in the back of the van with the handcuffed immigrant when he died from a savage blow to the groin. That is grounds for dismissal from any organisation, let alone the army. Whether they are then found guilty of murder by a court of law is a separate issue.
If Malta had the set-up, they would have been tried in a military court, and then God help them.]
Last year, Sgt Alexander Blackman, Royal Marines, was tried by court-martial, and was found guilty of no less than murder, and jailed for life, for shooting a mortally wounded Afghan insurgent.
Minutes before, the insurgent had been firing at Blackman’s patrol, and he would have died of his wounds anyway. But that’s justice for you.
Not in Malta.
This also happened under Mallia’s and Muscat’s watch. We still have no evidence that they didn’t delay rescue until it was too late. That’s another report they still refuse to publish “in the national interest”.
http://espresso.repubblica.it/internazionale/2013/11/28/news/lampedusa-buck-passing-on-the-massacre-so-they-left-syrians-children-drown-1.143363
What did Muscat call Angelina Jolie’s film? Ah, yes. a blokkbusterrr.
He wasn’t talking about this one:http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qgdwJCQyojQ
This happened on Muscat’s and Mallia’s watch. Where’s the evidence they didn’t delay rescue, in violation of international law? Muscat and his buddy Jeffrey Curmi are sitting on that information “in the interest of national security”.
http://espresso.repubblica.it/internazionale/2013/11/28/news/lampedusa-buck-passing-on-the-massacre-so-they-left-syrians-children-drown-1.143363
imes of Malta should rebrand itself as The Government Gazette II. Ariadne Massa is the real Director DOI.
Labour still believes in push back policy, even though the ECHR has ruled that policy violates international law. Their representative said so last night on national TV:
http://maltarightnow.com/news/2014/12/13/filmat-iva-nibqa-nsostni-li-nemmen-fil-push-back-policy/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
Joseph Muscat must follow Dr. Mallia down the road to oblivion. They are not worthy of leading the country and the sooner they go the better for all.
Is it possible that there are still so many idiots out there?
Our prime minister and his ex Army and Police Minister can be compared to Jack and Jill, always walking into mischief.
One hopes that this is not intentional, but due to not having matured enough, despite their age.
Last night Pullicino Orlando thought that he was being clever by bringing up this report. Less than 24 hours later, Daphne puts him in his place, hopefully never to get up again.
Hu go fik, JPO.
This is just another case of Joseph Muscat disproving his boast that he is not afraid to take hard decisions.
Cases where he failed to take a decision:
– not firing Manuel Mallia immediately;
– not firing Konrad Mizzi;
– successfully doing all he could to avoid the impeachment of Farrugia Sacco;.
– not giving us the facts on China;
– not giving us the facts on John Dalli, Shiv Nair and Sai Laing.
Cases where he is actually afraid to find himself in a position where he might have to take decisions:
– his fear of facing the press and free and proper questioning;
– his press conferences are no more than a monologue with himself as the sole speaker;
– inviting only tame and friendly journalists when travelling to China;
– not accepting invitations to send a party representative to Radio 101 or Net TV for current affairs discussion.
Cases where the wrong decisions were taken:
– interference in the police force and the army;
– disastrous appointments to public office;
– making his government beholden to and dependent on the Chinese communist dictatorship.
Coraggio, fuggiamo.
What kind of lowlife would use the unspeakable murder of an asylum seeker to hit back at the Opposition when he was hanging on to the report for 21 months.
We are truly scraping the bottom of the barrel.
What happened to the concept to serve? What a corrupt government.
Why is Arnold Cassola calling on Dr Muscat to publish the report on the migrant rescue delay where 400 asylum seekers lost their lives.
Is Malta going to be held responsible for this tragedy?
Because so many people died and no one’s been held to account, that’s why. If there’s nothing to hide, then all call and communication logs should be released.
https://www.facebook.com/11.10.2013.Lampedusa
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-12-13/local-news/Catholic-religion-no-longer-central-to-cultural-activities-President-Coleiro-Preca-6736127254
Good, give back the Catholic Church her schools, before the real fundamentalists get their way and expect Jesuits to teach Islam, free of charge of course.
There are still two more inquires hidden by Manuel Mallia which must see the light of day.
Let us hope Carmelo Abela makes them public.
Compare the back page epistle on Times of Malta today, written under the pseudonym of Joseph Muscat, with the real Joseph Muscat. Chalk and cheese. The man just knows how to waffle and hiss.
Is Muscat going to publish a report about this? Some of the victims are still looking for their children.
https://www.facebook.com/11.10.2013.Lampedusa/photos/a.213762778807420.1073741827.213760808807617/225491224301242/?type=1
Anyone who knows Dr Carm knows that he would not be able to sleep at night if he does not do whatever needs to be done to safeguard life. Any life.
I don’t know all the PL members of parliament but I would be delighted to find anyone on that side of the house who harbours his values.