Not a normal country
Well, actually I think it’s the people who aren’t normal – or rather, that abnormality is Malta’s normal. Somebody who has just returned from a week away to catch up with the events of the last few days has sent this in.
———–
Seeing the entire discussion in a telescoped version is surreal. In a normal country, the situation would have been done and dusted by now.
A man shoots directly at another man’s car as he drives off.
The shooter is arrested, arraigned, prosecuted for attempted murder, and eventually convicted and jailed.
Meanwhile, shooter turns out to be minister’s driver.
Minister resigns immediately. Prime minister accepts resignation without hesitation. Life moves on.
The leader of the Opposition doesn’t feature in all this.
End of story. Or so it should be.
Instead, everyone’s still discussing the incident, how it was (badly) handled, and the minutiae of Manuel Mallia’s and Joseph Muscat’s excuses, obfuscation and convoluted attempts at divesting themselves of blame.
It’s sick.
13 Comments Comment
Leave a Comment
They are also alienating us with Gozo bridge issue. They are throwing the billions and and millions at us so that we may forget the abnormal normality we have been made to lve these past few days.
Imagine this happened in Germany, and the driver shot at a British citizen. And imagine the German army accompanying a minister in a charity walk. Surreal.
They all make the same mistake and it always makes everything worse. Cover ups will always come to the fore of any misdemeanour.
It is becoming increasingly evident that the notorious ‘terremot’ that Muscat brought onto the MLP is pregnant with the seeds of its own destruction.
The strife that ordinary and respectable Labour supporters are feeling within and outside the party must be causing deep chasms.
The real pity is that it is the country, the state and its people which are innocent casualties in Muscat’s master plan.
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-11-24/local-news/Government-to-take-first-step-to-decriminalise-use-of-drugs-this-evening-in-Parliament-6736126248
They’re bloody decriminalising heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, and crystal meth.
It’s just 25 euros more expensive than pot.
Next step, legalise supply. Can’t have runners coming through customs with sachets in their stomach, or notorious dealers gunning down each other like there’s no tomorrow now can we?
I want to see Labour’s parliamentary group voting in toto the ultimate iced bun, Chris Fearne, Deborah schembri, Godfrey and Marlene Farrugia, that Silvio Parnis, Michael Farrugia, Helena Dalli, the same Muscat.
Where’s that Appogg chief?
It’s a proposal to settle the vote with cocainers that’s what.
Indeed this country is ‘ABSURD’ in all sense of the word.
A lot of people seem to think that the minister should resign because of his driver’s abhorrent behavior.
While there is a strong argument that supports this view, I feel that many are missing the real issue which is that the Minister acted very incorrectly when he tried to downplay the incident and repeated a lie, i.e. that warning shots were fired.
There also seem to enough evidence to show the his ministry attempted a cover up.
In addition, he is also responsible for the police, and therefore responsible for the fact that no charges were made against the driver.
Too simple for us, I’m afraid. Mallia employed his personal driver without due diligence and assented to him carrying a firearm without due diligence.
He needed a cover up so his personal advisers provided him with one and in doing so made his position even more untenable. The victim got arrested, the perpetrator stayed free for days.
If a Minister’s entourage is riddled with people who have a history of police investigations and/or criminal charges, that Minister has to answer to the country as to his bad choices, and what arises from them, by resigning.
It is either incompetence or corruption when you employ unprofessional shady types. It is arrogance when you stay put with egg all over your face.
Malta is not a normal country because the suspicion exists that the people in government might well have been bankrolled by drug money.
The new laws (http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20141124/local/drugs-reform-law-in-parliament-today.545501) are there to broaden the scope of drug trafficking by making it perfectly fine to carry small amounts (simply increase the number of drug mules) and to consume drugs (increase the demand for drugs).
I am sure that this is the change that Malta needed. I refuse to have my children brought up in a drug-free-for-all country and urge the Nationalists to oppose this law and eventually repeal it.
“suspicion exists that the people in government might well have been bankrolled by drug money.”
I am morally convinced that it has been bankrolled by drug money – just look at who is actually governing the country. No wonder that they have all of a sudden become completely paranoid on security.
It’s called getting away with the maximum number of transgressions while paying the least possible price. A criminal lawyer’s bread and butter.
In Malta we do not do cut and dried, it doesn’t benefit those on the take.
So what do you expect when you have a member of Cabinet, indeed a deputy leader, shielding a cocaine user/dealer simply because he is a Laburist and involving a police officer, also a Laburist to help him escape justice?
On resignations, responsibility, accountability and dignity:
http://time.com/3602096/chuck-hagel-pentagon-resign/