War on the bourgeoisie!!!!!!!!!!!
Mark “Realta'” Camilleri says that he is struggling to finish his MA in political and development history. I can see why. Please read his scintillating blog-post below.
It’s not just the writing. It’s the poverty of thought, crass stupidity and logical fallacies – starting from the first one: if the result is good, then the act which brought it about wasn’t bad.
Exactly why is the University of Malta allowing people like this to graduate? It devalues the achievements of those who really deserve their degree.
————
MARK CAMILLERI
I have no doubt that that the Government did not act strictly according to law when nationalising the bank, but that’s not the point: nationalisation has proved to be a great economic success.
(…)
The National Bank and its subsidiaries were owned by the some of the richest men in Malta: yes, you heard that right, it was the bank of Malta’s crème de la crème. This fact was already a problem by itself. Malta’s bourgeoisie was never innovative and although rich and powerful, it never took a leading industrial role in Malta’s economy. Historically, Malta’s bourgeoisie was mostly engaged in trade and property speculation. Those who invested in manufacturing were a minority and their investment was never big. A case in point is the Marquis John Scicluna, who invested in a brewery and was the owner of Scicluna’s Bank: a subsidiary of the National Bank.
(…)
Even to this very day, the Maltese bourgeoisie have not changed their ways. Malta’s bourgeoisie as a class is still stagnant with large piles of money sitting idly in their bank accounts. Albert Mizzi is a perfect example of the idle and uncreative bourgeois. He is a man who made a fortune from trading, and when his fortune grew, he simply invested it in the construction industry: simple.
During the 1970s, Malta was undergoing a rapid stage of development and the nationalisation of all banks was an important factor which lead to the diversification of Malta’s economy. Soon after the National Bank become the Bank of Valletta, Government bought all the shares from Barclays Bank and turned it into Mid-Med Bank. Both banks acted as developing agents under an interventionist Government which planned and built the economy block by block. An interventionist Government which acts as a planner is a perquisite in ALL developing countries and Malta was no exception.
Mintoff was right in taking over the National Bank, regardless of his abrasive nature. I wonder what the Maltese bourgeoisie would have done if they would have kept the bank: while the country was struggling to create jobs and develop the economy, they would have probably used to the money to build some fancy sea-side resorts.
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Oh dear. Doesn’t Mark Camilleri’s definition make Mintoff a member of the idle bourgeoisie?
Yes, Mintoff is petite-bourgeois.
Mark, your views are not merely socialist, but clearly and inherently Stalinist. I never thought you were so authoritarian. You had me fooled with your anti-censorship stance.
You’re going to upset a lot of Mintoff’s fans with that remark. So much for his posturing as the little man and champion of the dispossessed.
@ Kenneth Cassar
Mark Camilleri is what is known in common parlance as a hypocrite.
One cannot get more dictatorial than that.
The last paragraph says it all. The bourgeois as a separate entity to the country.
The way he tries to blame Malta’s entrepreneurs for the industrial architecture has to be the silliest argument I’ve ever heard. But then, he seems quite sure of what risking one’s capital and employing others is about.
Mintoff considered the dockyard, an artificial phenomenon, as the ideal setting for his ‘interventionist’ policies. Instead of phasing it out, he used it to threaten the western bloc and keep the workers under control. When gainfully occupied means social order alone, it’s enough.
Is he by any chance, one who prefers not having capitalists’ superyachts in the midst of Cottonera? When a Marxist kicks off the economical prose, it goes all sticky romantic.
Fancy sea side resort? Didn’t Mintoff expropriate property to build some of those himself? Doesn’t the proletariat deserve a well earned rest anyway?
The mind boggles.
What an idiot ! This brand of Marxism-Leninism is so austere that even Mario Vella would find it offensive.
We have Judges Emeritus, Presidents Emeritus, and now….Ambassador Emeritus. Who is the next Emeritus?
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120529/social/Vincent-Esposito.421785
Ca Ira
Ca Ira
Les aristocrats a la lanterne.
How shallow. Miskin.
Mark Camilleri must be told that Malta acquired real economic independence thanks to honest enterprise of the National Bank of Malta, particularly in the tourism and manufacturing industries.
That’s the lost chapter in Malta’s history.
Get an eyeful of this, from someone calling himself “Progress”:
“James next thing i know is let all these immigrants take over and let Sharia laws be implemented, we have so many foreign prisoners in jail paid by us citizens to nourish them, sorry i was in a jury on three occasions in the UK, and believe me jurors are chosen like a lottery and must be intellectuals, same here James, you are insinuating that Maltese jurors are biased, not at all, I do believe that Maltese people in general are racists in a way that our culture cannot change, we want to remain Europeans, and educated enough not to tolerate foreigners to come here and get pissed as a fart and cause trouble. This is happening cause in their country they have alcohol abolished”.
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/en/blogsdetails/blogs/Trial-by-prejudice
He says he was chosen as a juror three times, and follows it by saying that jurors must be intellectuals. Incredible.
“The National Bank and its subsidiaries were owned by the some of the richest men in Malta: yes, you heard that right, it was the bank of Malta’s crème de la crème. This fact was already a problem by itself.”
I cannot believe I am reading this in 2012. Mintoff’s legacy still lives on.
Someone with a MA in political and development history is harmless. We should be more concerned with the scores of charlatans who are allowed to graduate and practise as lawyers.
A born-again Varist Bartlu and future editor of Maltastar and Minister of Education.
“Exactly why is the University of Malta allowing people like this to graduate?”
Probably for the same reason that people who cannot tell the difference between a Roman coin and a coke bottle-top were allowed to graduate in archaeology. Kaboom!
[Daphne – I very much doubt that happened. The archaeology course is one of the most rigorous. But then I’ve had the privilege of knowing that from the inside.]
Yes, an interventionist government created a lot of jobs.
Ah, yes. Remember the budget tal-Qawsalla, and the wild promises to legislate thousands of jobs into existence? And then thousands remained unemployed and hundreds lost their jobs.
The main problem that I see is that we are heading for another interventionist government led by Joseph Muscat.
With Marxists like these, business is soooo safe.
Oh for f**k’s sake, what the hell is he on about?
Mintoff was right about taking over the bank, without allowing the Central Bank to do its most basic function and be the lender of last resort?
Didn’t Mark ever read economics 101 at university?
Nationalisation of all banks led (not lead, Mark) to the diversification of Malta’s economy? Was he high when he came up with this?
And isn’t he all about freedom and liberty? It can’t get more autocratic than what he is suggesting.
But for these leftists, its all about porn and gejs which makes you a liberal.
Bluuurrghhhh. What crap. He could learn a thing or two from a turnip.
The grand theft of the National Bank, Barclays Bank and Lombard Bank was a major reason why direct foreign investment was so poor in the seventies. Who would want to invest millions in a country where the government would steal your investment as and when they deem fit.
The result was there for everyone to see…Pijunieri, Dirghajn il-Maltin, Kisser u Sewwi and the rest of the crap that followed.
The only people interested in investing here where the Chinese who even then produced inedible chocolate and a textile factory that never exported as much as a pair of knickers.
Insejt l-industrija tal-kappar.
Who is teaching the course? Is it who I think he is?
Like Lorry Sant helped to develop and build the economy block by block. U hallina!
Maybe he meant that Lorry Sant built the green areas block by block?
Mark Camilleri’s whole blog-post could be summed up in one word – lanzit. Unfortunately, there’s no English equivalent which is as expressive.
That is exactly what I was about to say – x’lanzit ghandu dal bniedem, besides a very very big chip on his shoulder.
Yet another Laburist who thinks that the end justifies the means. How I hate this flawed reasoning.
Incredible but true. The National Bank was a class war not an economic issue which is why both sides of the house aided and abetted the act and its subsequent actions.
But the rule of law must apply to ALL, even to the idle rich as it MUST apply to the idle poor that live off benefits like there is no tomorrow !
Is he real?
Is this the type we are helping with our taxes?
Just stop the stupid idea of paying these scum the stipend.
It would be more to the country’s benefit if the money was spent on more public lavatories.
Post-graduate students have to pay for their studies and do not receive a stipend.
How very stupid! If this Camilleri chap said he is finding it difficult to get his degree, then he should revise his reasoning.
Does Camilleri know how many people those he mentioned employed?
Does he know that the brewery went from good to better to best with thousands employed?
I think the university people should get up and examine their conscience before dishing out degrees to people like this.
Mark Camilleri is one of those unformed innocents who think wealth is a crock of gold sitting under a rich man’s bottom and all they need to do is take it over.
It never occurs to the Mark Camilleris of this world that they could set about generating wealth themselves, rather than siphoning it off into this sort of crap.
So according to this guy the end justifies the means and to hell with the consequences.
Doesn’t he understand that no matter who you are, you can never sleep safe with a government that espouses this mentality?
Besides, what’s wrong with fancy seaside resorts? Aren’t they an investment too?
It’s not as if the manufacturing industry didn’t turn out to be a dead end after all, especially the efforts made at the time in the form of Mintoff-spawned brilliant ideas such as the egregious Desserta factory. I guess that was also financed with the aid of the Bank of Valletta.
Issa sew. Dan il-gvern jaf jaghti kumpens lix-shareholders tan-National Bank f’shares tal-BOV. Imbaghad jerggha jitla’ gvern intervenzjonista ta’ Joseph Muscat u jaghmel bhal Mintoff, jerggha jiehu kollox. Biex ipoggi l-banek “f’idejn il-haddiema” u b’hekk tinholog “middle class gdida.”
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/en/newsdetails/news/national/National-Bank-shareholders-to-seek-out-of-court-settlement-20120529
What an idiot.
I’d like to see him call Albert Mizzi an idle businessman to his face.
He is many things, but idle is not one of them.
Ironically he is one of the people who benefited most from Mintoff’s tenure, becoming Boeing’s Malta agent while chairman of Air Malta.
Sometimes I wish that time travel was possible just to send idiots like this one to the seventies and leave them there for the rest of their miserable life.
Albert Mizzi is also a National Bank shareholder.
Call for the men in white coats someone.
Arrogance and ignorance are a lethal combination and this guy has tons of both.
He described himself as an “aspiring historian” when he had the audacity to slam the film ‘Dear Dom’ without having seen it on the premise that he looked at its bibliography and decided that it wasn’t worth seeing.
He totally failed to understand that the credits to a film are not akin to a bibliography. Even when his error was pointed out he still persisted in his argument even though it was clear that its basis was flawed. If it were for him he would have had this film censored. What a hypocrite.
This entry on the National Bank shows clearly how this “aspiring historian” intends to play a part in the rewriting of history.
Yet another Che Guevara wannabe with a misplaced admiration for our own local dictator. What he fails to understand is that in robbing the bank from its owners, Mintoff sought to control the economy by creating the new class of wealthy.
He did it for his self ingrandisment.
No Robin Hood, but simply a vindictive envious bully who misused the power he had and caused much harm to many families. That he did it in the interests of Malta and the ‘haddiem’ is just the excuse that we have been fed to justify his corrupt misdeeds.
I was thinking of never returning to your site since you’ve been deleting all my comments of late … but here I am to ask you: where did this appear?
[Daphne – I have not deleted all your comments, but only some of them. If you wish to comment in what might well be a slanderous manner, about third parties, kindly use your own name and also your own blog, and be responsible at law yourself. Don’t try to use me to get at others. As for this piece, it appeared on his blog.]
Let me just tell you that everything I tell you is 100% true. I have never tried to mislead either you or your readers.
Still, you haven’t told me where this Mark Camilleri piece has appeared … would you oblige?
[Daphne – It’s his blog. I don’t have the domain to hand – camillerimark blogspot or similar.]
It’s very easy to find the source. Just copy a whole paragraph and Google it.
Magister Artium tal-hara.
This bloke should be sent back to secondary school.
This is a ‘perquisite’.
Camilleri talks a lot of shit. Industrial estates were built by the Nationalist government of the 60s from scratch, long before Bank of Valletta, Mintoff “sab is-sodda mifruxa” and, with few exceptions, filled up the estates with low-tech crap – mostly textiles.
The real reason for BOV and Mid-Med was extremely simple: if you wanted money, you had to kiss MLP ass, full-stop.
This revisionism of the facts that make up our history has to be actively confronted. Younger readers, please look and learn.
When reading your comment, I remembered that the GWU refered to the building of industrial estates as “cimiterji tal-fabriki”,
It has become rather blatant lately. I think 60s Malta is the best answer to the Golden Years and this piece is just an attempt to kill any discourse.
The University of Malta, from what I can gather, has become an Orwellian workplace.
The University of Malta has become a hive of Marxist thinkers. Lecturers dole out Socialist propoganda disguised as knowledge.
A couple of weeks ago, one student had the courage to walk out half way through a lecture because he could not stomach the lecturer’s blatent political bias.
After he walked out, the lecturer invited anyone who wanted to leave to go ahead. He went on to say that no, his classes were not innocent or unbiased and it was his class so he can say what he wanted. Again, he repeated that those who did not care for his opinion are welcome to leave.
This lecturer is using the lecture as a platform and hiding behind the excuse that the subject is political to propogate his socialist beliefs, with the added privilege of being paid while doing so.
Imagine, a yearly unit made up of two hour lectures every week, listening to this drivel.
I am not in the least surprised by what Camilleri wrote, actually I’m surprised there aren’t more who promote his line of thinking.
Those who come to university from a Labour background feel right at home because they have lecturers who can articulate what they have been taught at home. The lecturers make their beliefs concrete where at home they are intangible or symbolic at most.
This is because they have never experienced a Labour government, but only hear how all their problems will be solved when they are in power.
It shows the guy is a socialist – his idea of innovation and industrial success is only measured in the successes of the manufacturing sector.
Not even that, he measures industrial success in the number of people employed, even if the setup bleeds a country dry. We had the docks, other countries had automobile plants run by unions.
We lost a billion euros, they screwed the brands. Morris Marina anyone? How about an Arna?
If he really wants to make a case study, just for comparison, he should have a look at the reddest of regions up north, Emilia Romagna, and see how they defended their capitalist employers against any state, read union, interference.
Compare this with the Alfasud disaster in Naples and Sicily, the result of direct state intervention to create jobs.
Emilia Romagna today doesn’t only have the world’s premium brands in the automotive and motorbike industry, but also the capacity to actually create new ones, the heritage inherited from the region’s reputation itself.
This bloke needs to get off his high horse and get an education.
Hemm hu l-lanzit. Dan xi dixxiplu Marksist ta’ Sceberras Trigona?
Hekk hu. Il-lanzit ixxommu minn seba mili il-boghod.
Isn’t he the same person who had written the famous university newspaper article?
[Daphne – No, actually he was not. Alex Vella Gera wrote that story and Mark Camilleri published it in a university newspaper which he edited.]
I tend to agree with Mr. Camilleri that most of the Maltese entrepreneurs are uncreative and only capable of making money through traditional industries like construction and property speculation.
The statistics don’t lie: Malta is one of the countries that spend least on R&D among EU member states (http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/R_%26_D_expenditure), though, to be fair, the statistics are showing and upwards trend. But I imagine that’s mostly coming from foreign-owned businesses operating in Malta, like pharmaceutical companies, ICT firms, etc.
Regarding the National Bank, there’s no denying that BOV was a great success, so maybe Mintoff was right to nationalise it after all. However, I think the shareholders should have been adequately compensated. If they weren’t, they should be now!
On another note, Mr. Camilleri may be stupid as you say, but, trust me, as a (mature) student myself, I know through fist-hand experience that he’s still better than most other students out there.
[Daphne – Another one who doesn’t know what a logical fallacy is. ‘The bank went on to become a great success, therefore Mintoff was right to nationalise it.’ You can’t see what’s wrong with that statement because the whole process has been dehumanised. So let’s just change that, allowing you to see things more clearly and where your reasoning is wrong. A woman is kidnapped, held captive, tortured and gang-raped. She becomes pregnant and gives birth to somebody who grows up to become one of the greatest musicians the world has ever known. Using your line of reasoning, this not only justifies the crimes committed against his mother, but actually makes them necessary and desirable, because without those crimes, the great musician would never have been conceived.]
For the same reason Mintoff should have nationalised crime because as we love to say in Malta, “crime pays”.
With such garbled writing and poor English I’m surprised this guy made it to university in the first place.
So true.
@Joe Borg
You cannot connect R&D spend to entrepreneurs to conclude that they are an uncreative bunch only capable of making money through property and construction. If it is such a no brainer, how is it that you or Mark Camilleri do not invest their money to join the ranks of the rich and lead idle lives? I would but I cannot because I do not have whatever makes that phenomenon we call entrepreneurship and creativity in the business realm.
Even if Maltese did spend all their investment capital in property and construction (nobody has shown statistics to support the claim yet), this does not mean that they do not do it without innovation. One cannot proceed to draw conclusions and generalisations simply by opening the window and looking at the passers-by.
R&D is not simply investing to create the next generation of computers. Consider, for example, the late Censu Tabone and his innovations in ophthalmology. Consider, Shireburn and the success it has in the US. Consider, GFI, a company that started out locally (I know the founder) and is now global. I will ask you to consider your own colleagues and see how they solve problems. You will see innovation in the making.
There are many more examples of organisations that are Maltese/Maltese owned in IT, the hotel industry, brewing, wine making and so on that are making inroads overseas. That process takes time.
I would suggest that, as a mature student, you do not easily believe so many unsubstantiated claims and look at what is written critically.
I read the entire article of Mr Camilleri and aside from the various correct comments made above, from my perspective, it is an attempt to copy the style and critique of Marx without the intelligence and analytical prowess of Marx. Irrespective of whether one agrees with Marx, the man is hailed as one of the most brilliant scholars of all time at par with Adam Smith, Josef Schumpeter and others.
Mark Camilleri has absolutely none of these qualities; his writing is turgid. It is full of sweeping statements, one after another, to dupe readers rather than convince them about its logic and intelligence.
If you do not believe me about this Marxist style, visit his site and have a look at the last paragraphs of the About section – he aspires to fully understand Marx’s theories in Das Kapital. How can you aspire to do something like ‘fully understand’ when it is more than 3 life times of scholarly work to get close?
Don’t get me started. I promised myself not to comment on this particular post – it’s too depressing to realise that there are people who still believe this nonsense.
I don’t join the ranks for the same reason that is keeping you from doing it. But my opinion is that entrepreneurship is more about being a risk-taker than being creative. The latter is not a prerequisite, but the former certainly is. And to be completely honest, I’m also very lazy, but, believe or not, that’s apparently a good thing in my profession.
Anyway, unfortunately, statistics and experience are all the tools I have to gauge the innovative qualities of Maltese businesses, and if I had to rely solely on experience, my assessment would be far more negative. I met far too many businesses that are just behind the money, with no innovative drive or values whatsoever.
Of course, I’m speaking in general terms here. There are exceptions, but they are rare and far between. As the proverb goes, “one swallow doesn’t make a summer.”
Consider yourself lucky that you can look around and “see innovation in the making.” I wish my colleagues were as fine as yours. Alas, they are not! (Not that I’m any better)
Back to the National Bank argument, when I said that nationalising the bank was perhaps the right thing to do, I was separating it from the method the government of the time used to force shareholders to relinquish their shares. As I already said, if the alleged threats and violence are proven to have happened, the shareholders should be compensated adequately.
Furthermore, I don’t think the comparison with rape is fair. Rape is a barbaric act, but nationalisation is not intrinsically bad; it’s a tool in the hands of the state to safeguard the economy. People at the time voted for such policy, and that is what they got. Thank goodness, it turned out to be a success in the long run.
Just for a minute, let’s suspend the notion that robbing a bank is not right.
Let us assume that government knew best and it made the right move.
Let us assume that an interventionist government creating jobs by employing a group to dig holes and another to fill them up was what Malta needed at the time
What about the human element of robbing someone of his life savings? What about depriving families of their rightful income from their shares in the National Bank?
This smacks of Robespierre.
Hopefully this MA student would find a job in the bowels of University and is not let loose on Maltese society.
Daphne, you rock. So again, well done for all this good work.