GUEST POST: Muscat has caused so much damage to Malta’s reputation that he has to go

This guest post is written by Evangelina Azzopardi, an expat who has lived in Malta for the last 17 years and works in the remote gaming industry.

Being a foreigner in this country, for 17 years now, and in the remote gaming sector for more than 10 years, I have seen this industry growing from very few, very unstable companies to major players with the most renowned names of the industry, some of them stock-exchange-listed in different parts of the world.

Because remote gaming was booming, a number of large software providers, some Maltese, most foreign-owned, have settled here in Malta to service the industry.

As a citizen of another country, but having made Malta my home, for the opportunities I have found for myself and later for my children, I have been following up closely the past year political scandals, until the election announcement was made.

As we go along, and as I listen and read information from both sides, I want to address these observations and questions to the Prime Minister.

You have been so far addressing your people – Maltese people – but you seem to forget that a large part of the Maltese economy’s strength and stability has been generated by foreign-owned companies.

We are not your people because we are not Maltese and we cannot express our lack of confidence, anger or fears to you by going to the polls and show our disapproval.
We have been watching carefully, since the Panama Papers story started involving your government and the people who are closely advising you, hoping, every step of the way that you will do what is right, because you know that thousands of jobs, many of them jobs of Maltese people, are at risk if the country’s reputation keeps going downhill because of your inaction or action.

You have actually taken advantage of the fact that we have no voice in the electoral process, not to tell your people, your Maltese people what may happen to their jobs if you get re-elected.

You are taking advantage of the fact that most of us, people who are not yours, have actually worked to build this industry, promoted it, worked days and night to see companies flourishing, to attract others and bring all our colleagues, from all over the world, to come to Malta to bridge the gap of the skills and numbers of required employees that Malta could not cater for, to get the credit for the stable and growing economy.

I have been reflecting and asking myself: do you, Prime Minister, tell your people the truth, which is that you have nothing to do with the success of this industry but that it is mainly your predecessors and us, the foreigners who have given the opportunity to your people to be able to get jobs, some at entry level, for at least double the minimum wage?
Do you tell your people that it is because of us that they are building and renting their flats at such an advantageous rate?

Do you tell your people that employment in the construction industry, real estate, catering industry, taxi services, and many other sectors, has been flourishing because of us – the people you choose to ignore?

Will you tell your people that if this has to go, they will have to go back to working in factories or call centres for half the pay they get now?

Will you tell your people that they will not be able to pay their loans anymore, that the flats they have been renting for years will be empty?

Have you mentioned to your people that after the announcement of Brexit, few of the largest gaming companies based in Gibraltar, employing thousands of people, considered Malta as their European relocation destination? Malta has a similar climate, and has a mature industry and a trained and flexible workforce, so that would have eased their transition. But they didn’t, all the same.

Will you tell your people that the more time passes, and these investors read the news about Malta here in the national newspapers and in the European press, this reputation is being damaged, and this is not a loss for the government, because all they have to lose is their seat in power, but it is our loss because they are missed opportunities of further growing the hub which the Maltese people and we foreigners have managed to build in all these years of hard work?

Sadly, I know these are rhetorical questions which you have dodged so far and will do your damnedest to keep dodging. I can only hope the people of Malta, who I love and with whom I have staked my future and my fortune for so long, can join the dots you are rubbing out for them.

For the sake of Malta’s economy and the future of the jobs that now exist and others that must be created to keep up the pace, you have to go.