The government is lying to you again

The government is lying to you again – and this time, unsurprisingly, it is on the subject of Muscat’s Jordanian building contractor friend, Hani Hasan Naji Al Salah, whose Sadeen Education Investment Ltd is represented in Malta by the Labour Party’s auditor, Deo Scerri, at whose office address the company is registered.

In the debate, such as it is, on the transfer of a huge tract of public land at Zonqor Point to Mr Al Salah for his commercial use (his establishment will be a for-profit commercial enterprise, and not a proper university as we know it), the government has argued that it would “have the right to operate the university in case of force majeure”.

Ah, but it couldn’t. Accreditation for colleges, universities and schools is issued not to the institute itself, but to the operator to run the institute. The head of the accreditation board, Martin Scicluna, should of all people know this.

So if Mr Al Salah goes bust, pulls out, starts running a training camp for Saudi-sponsored terrorists, or turns the place into a holiday village for ‘business students’, the government of Malta, or anyone else, would have to apply afresh for accreditation if it wishes to take over.

And that’s assuming it would show willing to challenge Mr Al Salah in his operations, which is not going to happen if the government continues to be this one.

We really don’t know what has happened under the table, because there has been nothing clear and transparent about this process, and the government’s absolute determination to give this land to Mr Al Salah whatever it takes, and to nobody else, and the way it has allowed him to ‘sponsor’ the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting with the name of a ‘university’ that doesn’t exist and which does not even have accreditation still less a building or staff or students, speaks for itself.

Under the law, you cannot transfer ownership of accreditation for a university or college or similar. Secondly, the operator must be a named individual – at law, and of course in reality. So, even were accreditation to be sought, it cannot be “the government”, but a named director of the prospective institute that submits the application.

This means that he or she would have to be identified, and that in turn means, since it is “the government” which would run the institute, that he or she would have to be a civil servant or at any rate someone within the government structures.

In a country overflowing with lawyers and legal experts, not one has challenged the legal facts as stated by the government. This government gets away with murder because we let it. And some people actually love it.

Hani Hasan Naji Al Salah, to whom the prime minister has given Cottonera Dock No 1 and the Marsascala public pool and environs on a silver platter and without a public tender. And nobody has asked the most crucial question: why this man in particular, and why is Muscat so determined to accommodate him?