Outgoing EU Commission President Barroso spoke for us all when he said in the Luxembourg court this afternoon…
Published:
July 7, 2014 at 4:14pm
“I could not understand how (Dalli) could have these bizarre meetings thousands of miles away from the European Commission. Without any officials being present. And these meetings being organised by a bar or restaurant owner.”
There are some people in Malta who think that kind of thing is normal. Well, good luck to them and too bad for the rest of us that one of them is the prime minister. But the world they inhabit is not the real world.
That kind of thing might be fine in China, Italy, the Middle East and North Africa, where democracy and checks and balances are dirty words among the ruling class, but it’s considered unspeakable in the more civilised parts of Europe.
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Barroso makes a very important distinction about this whole affair. It is in Dalli’s interest to mix what is legal and what is ethical.
Even if Dalli did nothing wrong according to law, his position would still have been untenable.
Barroso: “Because this was a political decision. I even told him it would be very difficult for you to go about doing your work while being dogged with this affair.”
Barroso: “It’s a political decision. We are not here in the field of labour law. We are here in the field of a very high ranking politician who has some obligations under the treaty. He can seek legal advice later.”
I hope Joseph Muscat is following the process, and that his aides are preparing a White House style podium with several flags for the big announcement that he has sacked Dalli as his adviser and consultant.
Sacked? Dalli?
Really Ciccio, I didn’t expect this from you.
Dalli will now be promoted to ‘Suldat tal-azzar’ modern style like Cyrus Engerer.
@ Ciccio
Much more likely than a sacking of his adviser and consultant Joseph Muscat would be acting more according to his usual form by giving Dalli a cuddle, welcoming him into the regiment of soldiers of steel and some transfer to some apposite newly created post in the LP setup and allowing him to carry with him any goodies he may have been receiving so far.
Barroso: “I did share the facts from the covering letter. The facts about the irregular meetings with the tobacco industry outside Brussels, in Malta. Without any official from the (European) Commission and with a restaurateur for a broker. If this is not reason enough to lose confidence, what is?”
‘these meetings being organised by a bar or restaurant owner.’ – Barroso
And a circus promoter to boot.
People often think that the reason why some countries are always poor and why some always seem to pull it off and be wealthy is because of resources, or ignorance or maybe even culture.
However there is another theory which I believe is correct. The reason why some countries are rich and some are poor is because of politics. Sometimes people underestimate how much politics and economics are connected.
Countries do well when politicians have rigid standards to live up to, where the people demand that politicians behave in a way that demonstrates a certain type of respect towards the institutions they head. Those institutions are some how endowed with a certain power that only exists because the rules, checks and balances, ensure that they do what they are designed to do.
They are the “killer apps”, as it were, of a successful democracy, and like those apps on your phone, if they don’t work the way they are supposed to, the way people naturally expect them to, then the country fails.
It fails because there is no guarantee that the person in charge is going to serve the people. Sure, other rich countries have come up with bad ideas and policies, but those countries don’t fall into chaos and ruin.
The politicians are changed because the people don’t want them, and rectifying the situation is done with less complication because every department and system does what it says on the tin. There are corrupt or self-serving politicians everywhere in the world, but in places like the UK, Germany and the US for example, they rarely bring the whole country to ruin.
But I do not believe that Malta has mastered this yet. Democracy is not second nature to everyone there at all. Although the PN did manage to move Malta away slowly from the old way of being, they didn’t manage to instil the democratic spirit in Malta.
Those informal networks, which came out of Mintoff’s corrupt rule in order for people to survive, have persisted. There was a slow and gradual move away from them, but when survival kicks in we fall back on them. It’s happening again now.
Maltese people like the informal aspect of Malta’s political culture. It makes us feel that we have something of a direct democracy. But without proper protocols and rules for it, it takes on qualities of corruption.
It’s tough to draw the line. For example, the PL make a huge fuss over some clock, but then no one bats an eyelid when we see lines of people outside the doors of politicians almost immediately after the election. What, exactly, is the difference?
The PN are better at democratic rule because, as you pointed out once, Daphne, we hold the PN to higher standards. We should be holding the PL to the same standards. Without those standards, Malta will fall into ruin just like all those other countries which have struggled to implement the rules and standards that guarantee success. Standards make politicians work harder to get it right.
The PN thought, and I think still do, that they were successful in bringing about a change of mentality. They weren’t. But that is the people’s fault for not being OK with reducing or eliminating altogether those informal networks and encouraging inclusive political institutions.
The short argument is that some countries and politicians respect the rule of law. Others don’t. Dalli falls into the latter category and, until he became commissioner, he lived and operated in an environment where the rule of law is a nominal reality, not an actual one.
Re your comment: >It’s tough to draw the line. For example, the PL make a huge fuss over some clock, but then no one bats an eyelid when we see lines of people outside the doors of politicians almost immediately after the election. What, exactly, is the difference?<
What's the difference? The difference is that each one of those queuing at the PL ministers' doors has his own version of the 'Tal-Lira' clock to hand over to the minister for favours done. In most cases it is their vote, the most precious thing I ever had in my life, having the power to vote for my own children. But PL voters choose to vote for their own personal selfishness and egoistic wet dreams such as hunting, illegal buidings, government jobs, unworthy promotions etc etc.
As for me, I have never attended a political meeting except the private school mega protest one and the post Raymond Caruana meeting way back in the years of lead aka the eightees. I have never entered a political party office or kazin, I have never knocked on a politician's door in my whole long life. I know of many others like me who have always voted PN for the same reason that I do: The future of my children, now grown up and now their own children.
My wish was always that the MLP would get its act together and learn from the PN, but alas this has ot happened yet and |I suspect that one fine day they will find themselves back on the opposition benches for a long long time. I just wonder what name they would give to the party then, so as to detoxify their reputation following their second try at governing.
From the way things are turning out, Dalli is simply tightening the noose round his neck and is going to lose the issue so effortlessly.
Why he had to go exposing himself this way, causing more damage to himself and to Malta’s reputation is beyond me but there again that is the makeup of the man, where background and DNA take over better judgement.
Yep. The way things are going the Court is going to have to conclude that (a) he resigned and even if not Barroso has every power and right under the Lisbon Treaty to demand resignation and (b) more importantly Barroso was justified in dismissing him for bringing the Commission into disrepute.
It just goes to show that, rather than have grounds to attack the allegations on points of fact, Dalli could only muster procedural defences that would only hold water in a monkey tribunal like that for the Maltese civil service…
No, what Dalli’s doing is closing on Muscat.
Dalli B.A. qed jifga fil-habel illi dawwar ma ghonqu hu stess.
‘I need to contact my wife. I need to see about my rights. My allowances and whether I have a pension’
Unbelievable.
The guy’s just been fired or asked to resign. He’s created one of the Commissions greatest f*ckups in years. He’s just dragged his name and his country’s reputation through the mud. He’s a millionaire, perhaps billionaire and he worries about his allowances and whether he will have a pension.
Was Dr. Gonzi far-sighted when Dalli was ‘kicked upstairs’?
He was stupid.
Ditto
Can John Dalli explain his secret Saturday visits to the offices of Alfred Mifsud’s company, Allcare, when staff were not around. These visits were taking place when he was still EU Commissioner.
Can Dalli explain his open campaign for the government to commission Sargas to build a power station, his critical remarks about Libya and Libyans during the uprising against Gaddafi, his trips to the Bahamas and his dealings with an international fraudster using a false passport, and his pervasive presence on Maltese TV grinding his anti-prime minister axe, all while he was EU Commissioner?