Facing a jury of one

Somebody must have thrown Minister Chris Fearne under that bus. Although things have been quite hushed back here in a Malta rife with rumours of every sort, his interview with Tim Sebastian on Deutsche Welle’s Conflict Zone last week is a must-see (watch it on DW’s Facebook page).

We hardly need to mention Tim Sebastian’s fame – his Hardtalk interviews are renowned the world over.

Chris Fearne, as the deputy prime minister, was the ‘victim’. He had to sit through Sebastian’s relentless questioning for half an hour and, quite frankly, he did not escape unscathed. Nor, for that matter, did his government... or Malta.

The volley of allegations lobbed at the hapless minister served to portray a side of Malta which we are often reluctant to acknowledge – a Malta with 28 bomb explosions, of which only two have been solved; a Malta which sells passports to shady persons (in the sense that they are not identified); a Malta where ministers and

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high-ranking officials identified in the Panama Papers have been kept on in spite of the fact that they are still under investigation (the minister’s words); a Malta that sells its hospitals to a company with no proven track record of running such an operation.

Fearne does not shine during this interview. With regard to the last point raised, he just says he did not sign the agreement with Vitals – as if that even matters in the end. Nor does the government – but we know that; we have known that for months, if not years. Sebastian did not bring up any new allegations; he questioned the minister on what had already been said in the media or by the European Parliament delegations and committees. It is the cumulative impact of all these allegations that is mind-boggling. He also brought up what Rosy Bindi – the head of the Italian anti-Mafia commission had said – but Fearne chose to describe her comments as mere allegations made on a local paper (this one to be specific).

Sebastian’s main thrust – if we can call it that – was that Malta is a country of soft justice, where one has the right to go to court and to appeal judgments, even if one happens to be the prime minister or a minister, and, as a result, criminals can get away with anything.

It is no coincidence, therefore, that Malta has slipped down the latest corruption index rankings. These things do not happen in a vacuum. Can anyone really downplay the impact this interview is likely to have on the German public’s perception of Malta – a state where the rule of law is supposedly paramount? The minister’s assertions in favour of the rule of law sounded very hollow as he was confronted with Sebastian’s hard-hitting questions.

In these turbulent times, we must keep everything in context, as we may otherwise fall prey to the government’s spin. We can easily be sidetracked and miss the wood for the trees.

The important thing is the overall picture, and the one resulting from Tim Sebastian’s interview is a gruesome one indeed.