Adrian Buckle, Stitching and Michael Zammit Maempel: completely ignored

Adrian Buckle

I find it totally outrageous that the barely coherent Mark Camilleri, Taghna Lkoll Young Mintoffian appointee to the chair of the National Book Council, has hogged the limelight in the news that the censorship, porn and blasphemy laws are to be repealed.

Camilleri was prosecuted and turned into a hero and martyr a few years ago for publishing a really crass short story in a university newspaper which he edited (the case obviously fell through).

Ironically, he was prosecuted under a law enacted in 1975 by his dead hero Dom Mintoff. But we never hear about that, do we – that this awful law was Mintoff’s doing.

Yet the people who got the ball rolling – theatre producer Adrian Buckle (formerly St James Cavalier director, resigned), husband and wife Christopher Gatt (formerly St James Cavalier boss, resigned 2013) and the actor Pia Zammit, the actor Mikhail Basmadjian, and their lawyer Michael Zammit Maempel (son of the now more famous Joe), working with lawyers Ian Refalo and Sarah Grech – have been completely ignored by the government and by the press on this matter.

This business didn’t begin with Mark Camilleri. It began with Adrian Buckle and a play called Stitching, which he was prevented from putting on.

Mark Camilleri did nothing but fluff about, panic, make a few truly incoherent statements to the press (in Maltese, because he is unable to speak English) and then accept his reward from the incoming Labour government: a gong in the Republic Day Honours List – which, like the hamallu he is, he didn’t bother to turn up for, and the chairmanship of the National Book Council when he can’t speak English.

Well done, Adrian and Michael. As for Mark Camilleri: shed your arrogance and take some TEFL classes. No educated person is able to communicate only in Maltese.