No contest
There is the growing perception, one more casually floated around these days, that there are no more Nationalists left and Malta has become entirely Labour. Well...
Rachel Borg is an independent columnist based in the tourism industry
Isn’t that just marvellous? Now families can go back to having their BBQs in peace and exchanging idle gossip over coffee and pastizzi in Valletta. Perhaps Franco Debono can go back to holding his head high as he struts up and down Republic Street (as always).
Self-interest being the Maltese people’s prime motivator, this recent amalgamation of the two main political camps must come as a relief to many crossover voters.
That sense of freedom from the guilt of supporting a violent and deceitful government is encouraged by the intransigence of the police toward crime and the march toward a police state.
You could be forgiven for thinking that this is what it must be like in the mind of the vast majority who voted Labour again. After all, the public can’t be expected to show anything but support for the Labour government, with its surpluses and positive economic sentiment; its survival of the Panama and Pilatus scandals; its European brothel escapades and rule of law reports – all crowned with the freezing of embryos against all sound moral (and professional) judgement.
With the government feeling as though it has come through the Daphne Caruana Galizia investigation unscathed and finally enjoying some breathing room after months of being hounded by Simon Busuttil, there is even a sense of euphoria bordering on the deranged.
The exposure of the government-sponsored Facebook groups, loaded with hatred, antagonism, intolerance, active bullying and until this week endorsed by the President of Malta and prominent members of the Cabinet of Joseph Muscat, himself included, betrays the arrogance and insecurity which are trademarks of the emboldened society that makes up the bulk of Malta today.
So widespread and unrestrained are the comments on these closed groups, spreading unbridled hatred and misogyny, that a counter measure is now seriously needed to offer some protection and intervention to the victims, who, ultimately, are anyone who dares to oppose the police state our country has become.
In Egypt, people are forcibly disappeared and only last week a lawyer investigating the murder of Italian student Giulio Regeni in Cairo, was himself forcibly disappeared at Cairo Airport on his way to a session of the UN working group on enforced or involuntary disappearances in Geneva, reappearing before prosecutors on Tuesday evening charged with “managing an illegal group, spreading false news… and co-operating with foreign organisations.” He is now facing up to five years in prison, but there is an NGO to deal with these investigations.
Lawyer Ebrahim MetwallyHegazy founded the Association of the Families of the Disappeared, which provides information to the Egyptian Commission for Rights and Freedoms, a Cairobased NGO headed by Mohamed Lofty.
It is time for concerned and threatened Maltese citizens and foreign residents to organise themselves in this way – a Maltese commission for rights and freedoms to defend our values and uphold our rights. The NGO is largely made up of lawyers who co-ordinate with families suffering the intransigence of the police, defending them and attending investigations.
Rather than disassociate the Nationalist Party from what is being labelled as the ‘Elite’, the time has come for honest and socially conscious lawyers to stand up and band together to bring the awareness and solidarity needed to defend our civil rights and freedom of expression. The group can encompass sympathisers from all sides sharing the same values.
There is also an urgent need to define freedom of expression, which not just lately, but perhaps even more recently, is abused instead of used to uphold its proper meaning. Would the President of Malta like to hold a serious seminar, including foreign representatives, to debate what constitutes real freedom of expression and perhaps balance some of the bullying and offending that has taken place? None of the officials who have lately denigrated freedom of expression have been held to account. Isn’t it at all pertinent to Joseph Muscat that all international bodies remark on the misappropriation of freedom of expression but only he and his cronies have no qualms about the issues raised? As they become more isolated in their defence of the indefensible, the Facebook groups come out in force to make legitimate what is illegitimate and go with might is right.
Within freedom of expression there is the tool of satire. Unfortunately, this is way beyond the masses on those Facebook groups, who are more at home with sarcasm and pageantry, which soon degenerates into an open war of words, insults and provocation – a return to tribal instincts aided and abetted by the Labour government and, until last Wednesday, conveniently sanctioned by Malta’s highest office. Funny how the President’s name seems to be everywhere but actually not.
In response, what we are seeing is a shift in the way politics is done in Parliament. The attitude of Opposition members has become one of speaking out about causes and injustices that directly affect their constituents. We need more and consistent efforts in this direction, with sustained journalism and with moral, civil and environmental issues taken up by civil society groups too.
The NGO proposed above could include journalists and writers and other academic and social activists. The extent of lawlessness in our country has taken us aback. We are shocked to hear about attacks on innocent persons, law-abiding citizens and at the way Malta is now associated with criminal gangs and organisations – all under the uncontested rivalry of what today is perceived to have become a Labour state.
Even with all the power and entitlement bestowed upon them, the social media gangs demonstrate chronic distress. They are caught in a warped circle of self-inflicted pain and false security. They cling to their outdated regime and try to re-generate it in material wealth and unchecked power.
It should not be that way. We need to cultivate an awareness of what is wrong and despicable behaviour, and not tolerate the mainstream view if it is unacceptable. We may have to accept that it will get worse before it gets better, just as calling out Jason Micallef on his behaviour meant even more awful reinforcement of his shameful attitude from other sleazy corners.
So now we accept that all of Malta shares the same views and that everyone is on the side of lawlessness. I would not be surprised if the next thing we begin to hear is that there is no purpose in holding an election other than to showcase the homogeneous hold of Joseph Muscat on the country.
How ironic it is that just as Malta had gained the respect of the European Union and other developed countries, we are now relegated to the level of corrupt regimes and the same style politics of the conflict-ridden Arab countries. Perhaps this is where we are most comfortable and Dr Muscat knows it.
Is there anyone other than the odd Member of Parliament to challenge this dangerous mentality and defend the law? Or is it the fashion now to hide behind the joke of no more Nationalists? One post more and they’ll be talking of the castrated.
Populist systems are bad enough. In the hands of a police state it becomes an assault weapon.
For those journalists and writers, MPs and civil movements that are speaking up and resisting the popular masses, it is a long road ahead, full of risk and at a personal cost. Having an NGO to which they could lodge their complaints and which could stand up for their rights would be beneficial and supportive.
One more cause to add to Puttinu Cares and L-Istrina. Maltese Commission for Rights and Freedoms. Maybe Muscat would like to make a hefty donation here too?