Franco Debono, Pawlu Lia and the Venice Commission

Both film buffs and those who are only superficially interested in cinema know that the major theme of classic Western movies was the imposition of law on a state of lawlessness. It was the retelling of the story of how the (Wild) West was won; how territ

The history of that not-sodistant past was romanticised by Hollywood. The biggest headache for filmmakers was how to portray a fundamental paradox: namely, that in the Wild West, lawlessness was defeated by resorting to unlawful methods. The most popular of these methods was the good gunslinger, who would pave the way for order in society by gunning bad gunslingers down, or even sheriffs who underperform.

But shooting people dead is unlawful (generally speaking, of course, as there are exceptions).

Because in his quest to end violence he resorted to violence, the good gunslinger would also ex

communicate himself; he would put himself outside the community, and would no longer form part of it. Once you kill – even for a good cause – you are an outcast, and you live somewhere outside society.

This fate awaited many West- ern-movie protagonists in their quest to tame the West and impose law and order on a lawless territory.

This is how I metaphorically see...

Franco Debono

I do not intend to express an opinion on whether what Franco Debono did many years ago was right or wrong. He saw things his way and did what he did – again, his way. What interests me here is how he viewed his ‘mission’. He believed that there was lawlessness in the justice sector and, like a good gunslinger, shot the sheriff. The thorny question is whether he should apologise to the minister of the time.

Franco Debono broke a number of unwritten political laws to pave the way for his vision of lawfulness in the justice sector. His vision was later carried to fruition by Owen Bonnici. Opportunistically, I would say. Still, what matters is that Franco Debono’s vision for reform was carried out.

I don’t know the background to the issues between Dr Debono and the PN, so I can’t say much. But from the outside, it seems like Franco Debono found himself without a political community for resorting to “unlawfulness” (I am using terms in a highly metaphorical way here – I do trust this is obvious – here I am referring to “political unlawfulness”) to impose lawfulness where, in his view, lawlessness thrived.

This is the great paradox Franco Debono finds himself in; and the paradox needs to be solved by the PN. The party has to decide whether to allow Dr Debono in from the cold, and what conditions to impose for re-admission, or whether to let him live beyond the frontier of lawful political society. In a way, it resembles the Western movie arch-dilemma.

Pawlu Lia

But while this deliberation might (or might not) be going on, Franco Debono wastes no time and is at it again. It seems to be his real calling in life to pave the way for the imposition of lawfulness by playing the role of the good gunslinger. Perhaps he’s not meant to be a parliamentarian, after all – or a haiku poet for that matter. Perhaps the role history has reserved for Franco Debono is that of he who lives without to impose lawfulness within. Such a role transcends petty politics and becomes the role of a non-political statesman; somebody who is instrumental in building the State. Such people are rare and their mission is not easy to understand. It is understood only in time.

This time round, the bad gunslinger is Pawlu Lia, and what a Western character Pawlu Lia would be! Pawlu Lia started his career as the junior partner of the brilliant and highly sophisticated Philip Sciberras (not only is Dr Sciberras a top legal mind, but he is also an excellent poet: read his book Mandala to savour his literary prowess), who used to be the Labour Party’s lawyer in part thanks to an old friendship with Alfred Sant. Then Pawlu Lia “inherited” Dr Sciberras’ brief... and more. But that’s another story. Let’s concentrate on ours.

Imagine Pawlu Lia in the middle of a dusty street outside a saloon in some God-forsaken town in the Wild West desert, with that cold, merciless look of his in his eyes and his hand itching to pull out that sixshooter from the single-loop holster and fill Franco Debono full of lead. What a great Hollywood villain Pawlu Lia would make! The wind would blow dry tumbleweed out of sight, and the clock inside the saloon would strike twelve.

AndFranco Debono would be faster on the draw.

High Noon the first blog

In a recent blog post of his, Dr Debono raised the following points.

He starts by setting the scene, stating that the situation is extraordinary. There are serious allegations of criminal behaviour being made against the prime minister and people close to him. Given that nobody is resigning, the situation is such that those who should be investigated by members of the judiciary are the very same people who appoint and/or promote those same members of the judiciary. Whenever the prime minister utters half a word to protect a minister against whom there are serious allegations of misconduct, any sane magistrate would perceive it as subtle pressure.

This is the scene. Then Dr Debono zeros in.

This is the moment the villain of the movie makes his ghastly appearance: Pawlu Lia. Whenever a magistrate, says Dr Debono in his blog, investigates the prime minister, the latter is assisted by his faithful hired gun Pawlu Lia. Not only does the prime minister have the power to decide on promotions in the judiciary, but he has appointed Pawlu Lia as his representative on the Commission for the Administration of Justice, which is the disciplinary body for magistrates and other members of the judiciary.

Now it is abundantly clear that Franco Debono has honed his skills as a top lawyer in the criminal field. He insightfully points out that Pawlu Lia’s presence on the commission can exert subtle pressure on the members of the judiciary even if he stays put and keeps silent.

In other words, Pawlu Lia’s mere presence is enough to exert pressure.

This time, more than a Western, it’s like that scene from The Godfather Part II, when Frank Pentangeli’s brother is brought in from Sicily by the Corleone family, habited in traditional Sicilian clothes. The brother is silent, just sits on the bench and watches, but Frank feels the pressure and decides to change his mind and not to testify against the Corleones. He later commits suicide in his bath tub, after a short conversation with the Corleone family lawyer. Although this is fiction, it’s still not notionally far from reality.

And Franco Debono, who has fully mastered the art of practising criminal law, knows how these things work and is pointing it out for us so that we can’t miss what’s going on in this national movie.

Franco Debono has more ammunition. Pawlu Lia’s appointment to the commission gives him an aura of immunity which discourages anybody thinking of reporting him for breach of professional ethics from actually doing so.

The gun smoke now subsides, and we can reflect on the points raised by Dr Debono. He himself places some pointers. He correctly states that members of the judiciary require serenity to carry out their functions properly, without any pressure, be it subtle, explicit, or otherwise.

Logically, Dr Debono asks how it can be possible that the government does not manage to appoint to the commission a lawyer other than the prime minister’s own personal lawyer. Is it possible, he asks, that there are no other capable lawyers on the islands? This is not the Philately Board, he exclaims.

This, by itself, is already a messy situation. It becomes messier when you consider that Pawlu Lia is not only the prime minister’s lawyer, but the lawyer of other prominent members of the administration who are being investigated or have to appear before the courts in relation to allegations of criminal activity.

High Noon the second blog

Not content with the first blog post, Franco Debono reprises his role in a second instalment.

This time, he highlights that Pawlu Lia’s appointment to the Commission for the Administration of Justice could be breaching the word and the spirit of the Constitution.

Dr Debono refers to Article 101A(7) of the Constitution, which regulates how the members of the commission are to behave. Lest we forget, this is the commission which disciplines members of the judiciary – it’s the collective judge which judges the individual judges.

According to this provision of the Constitution, the members of the commission have to act on their individual judgment and not be subject to the direction or control of any person or authority.

Dr Debono asks the only question logically possible: how can Pawlu Lia satisfy the Constitution when he is the personal lawyer of the prime minister and of prominent members of the current administration?

‘What is the Constitution saying here?’ asks Dr Debono. Quite clearly that the prime minister should appoint somebody and possibly never speak to them again, to avoid even giving the remotest of impressions that there could be some sort of direction or control.

But instead, we have the “absurd” situation – argues Dr Debono – where the prime minister’s representative on the commission which disciplines the judges before whom the prime minister has to appear in connection with serious allegations is none other than the lawyer who assists the prime minister before those very same judges!

Bottom line

This is scandalous at best; illegal and in flagrant breach of the Constitution at worst.