Lie to us some more, please – we just love it

The government has told The Malta Independent that Konrad Mizzi’s estranged wife, Sai Mizzi Liang, is still in her post in Shanghai “until a suitable replacement is found”.

There has been a call for applications to find a “suitable replacement”, the government said, and the process of going through them takes them. Meanwhile, she stays in situ.

Liars – lie to us some more, why don’t you, because we’re loving every minute.

The government was forced to speak, after months of running away from questions even into the current week, after I got the Malta Enterprise chairman, William Wait, directly on his mobile phone yesterday afternoon and was able to break this story. My call was prompted by the fact that, earlier in the day, I had received information from sources very close to Malta Enterprise that Sai Mizzi Liang had never been taken off the payroll there and that nothing had changed since the summer of 2013.

Mr Wait, who was extremely polite and civilised unlike so many of the uncouth savages I need to call in the course of my work, many of whom think that public officials have two options called ‘be rude and extremely hostile to journalists’ and ‘don’t bother answering their calls or questions’, was extremely clear in his answers to my very specific questions.

Mrs Mizzi Liang’s three-year contract expired in August last year. The position was advertised in the newspapers – Mr Wait could not remember when, or which newspaper, but thinks it was the Times of Malta. There were many applications, he said, but Mrs Mizzi Liang’s contract was renewed all the same, in the last quarter of the year – which means some time between October and December.

He was clear that her contract was renewed despite the post being advertised and applications received, and that it was renewed after this process and not when the contract expired in August.

I also asked Mr Wait whether the contract was renewed on the exact same terms as the original one, and he responded that it was. Anybody who is not completely ignorant of what a contract is will immediately understand that Mrs Mizzi Liang is the ‘applicant’ who got the job: she has a contract for the job. When you have a contract, the job is yours for the duration of the contract and you cannot be dislodged unless you violate the terms of the contract.

The casualness with which the government lies to us is shocking, breath-taking. First her husband lies to us and says that she will “transition into the private sector” when her contract expires in August. Then journalists spend months chasing the government for information about whether she really did “transition into the private sector” and if so, who her replacement is, and all questions are stonewalled and blanked.

Then the story is revived again by David Thake who chases the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after seeing that she is still on Malta’s list of ‘consuls’, and gets passed around from one desk to another.

Then I get the honest facts straight from the chairman of Malta Enterprise, with whom she signed her contract in 2013 – I thought I wouldn’t bother with the Minister for Malta Enterprise, Chris ‘Brothelgate’ Cardona – and faced with the facts reported in the press, and unable to blank them this time, THEY LIE.

What did we people of Malta do to deserve this? Hang on, no, wait, don’t answer that.