Adrian Delia anti-corruption pledge: beyond belief

I’d like to know how this Nationalist Party leadership contender defines corruption. Because his proclaimed stance against corruption – yesterday – certainly doesn’t fit in with some of his past behaviour.

Maybe he is one of those who thinks that corruption is putting cash into a brown envelope and passing it on to somebody in return for a favour to which you are not entitled. How simplistic.

He’s going to carry on fighting corruption, he said. How is he going to carry on fighting it? He has never so much as written an article or even a Facebook comment about embedded state and government corruption.

And some people think this man has leadership qualities. People who have a reputation to take care of, like Alexander Borg Olivier, the former prime minister’s son, are sticking their neck out for him all over Facebook and elsewhere, when they don’t know anything about him.

That is madness. Never give a testimonial for somebody you don’t know from Adam and about whose history and personality you know little to nothing. I learned that the hard way. Always, but always, trust your instincts – though you have first got to ensure they are honed. If alarm bells are going off somewhere in the back of your mind, listen to them.

I was raised on the tales of Hans Christian Andersen and Aesop, and even as a child I had worked out that they weren’t stories or fairy-tales but lessons. The lesson that is particularly relevant here is that contained in The Emperor’s New Clothes.