What you should know about the YMCA

On a daily basis they go about doing sterling work among the vulnerable and marginalized strata of Maltese society

They do this wholeheartedly, voluntarily, altruistically, with great sacrifice and never with any intention to steal the limelight. Indeed, they are hardly ever at the centre of media spotlight. On many occasions, they have been the unsung heroes of our country.

Just like the Scout Movement, the YMCA has long been an international Association with branches in most countries all over the world. The Young Men's Christian Association dates back to 1844 when a Londoner, George Williams, had an idea about how to make his community stronger. From that idea sprang a movement that would spread across the globe, inspiring millions to grow in spirit, mind and body. Throughout the years, they evolved with the times, from the Industrial Revolution to the Digital Revolution and made many important contributions to society along the way.

All along, especially here in our backyards, those making up the YMCA continually seek to create a supportive community to help all sorts of vulnerable people address pressing social challenges. I would dare state that as the nation’s perhaps leading nonprofit organization, the YMCA is committed to empowering people to reach their full potential, to improving well-being, inspiring action, strengthening communities and ensuring that everyone has the opportunity to become healthier, more confident, connected and secure. One need only recall how much help a substantial and unreported number of homeless people have received from the YMCA during the last few years. It is this organization that many times overrides the essential work and role of Statefunded agencies in the field of social work, youth sector and housing accommodation. Indeed, it often happens that this organization is the one able to provide and deliver when others fail. On a few occasions when I was assisting some people in dire need of some essential services and amenities, as a last resort I tried turning to the YMCA hoping for a positive response. And against all odds, they did deliver. Here I cannot fail to highlight the impeccable and praiseworthy qualities of leadership and management of the YMCA’s CEO, Mr Anthony Camilleri, under whose watch this organization always tries to go that extra mile.

It was only in April of 2021 that the government finally took the plunge and invested more than €1.5 million in assistance to the YMCA to spread its services to the community and offer psychological, physical and social support to the organisation’s clients, namely families, children and individuals. Let us face it, though most welcome, this government financial assistance is just a pittance considering the enormous, costly and voluminous work which the YMCA conducts within its various Teams set-up. In fact, this set-up consists of the national YMCA team, the residential programme team, the wellbeing programme team, the youth empowerment programme team, and last, but not least, the social business programme team.

YMCA has been operating since 1976 in Malta with specific programmes, services, and projects for the vulnerable sections of our society. And to do that YMCA is all the time dependent on support from all of us to join forces in raising essential and muchneeded funds. Although volunteer-based, it has to work out solutions on how to satisfy and settle the ever-increasing expense needed for providing its’ ever-expanding professional services to the vulnerable communities. Expenses are every year in the six-digit total verging on the seven-digit.

Internationally, there are some really interesting historical facts associated with the YMCA. Williams had created the first prototype of the YMCA in response to the industrial revolution’s negative effects in England. The organization eventually spread to more than 120 countries. At one time, Williams even introduced exercise programs but these were initially opposed by certain quarters on the basis that the theologically-inclined YMCA had no business getting involved with physical education. Basketball was invented by a YMCA employee by the name of James Naismith. Volleyball was a YMCA invention, too, this time by a volunteer by the name of William G. Morgan. Henry Dunant, who passionately fanned the YMCA’s flames throughout Northern Africa and Europe, helped found the Red Cross, and—in 1910—won the original Nobel Peace Prize for his achievements. Former American President George H. W. Bush helped start a local YMCA branch in Midland, Texas, way back in 1953. The word ‘bodybuilding’ was coined by a physical culturist, Robert J. Roberts, doing voluntary work with the YMCA. In the 1920s, despite having commanded a strong presence in Czarist Russia, the U.S.S.R. shut down all of its YMCA branches, barring the organization until 1990. During World War I, various YMCA branches throughout Europe sponsored a group of specially-trained bulldogs to carry cartons of cigarettes to nervous soldiers across war-torn Europe. Last, but not least, we have the YMCA volunteer, Sonora Louise Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington to thank for having introduced and developed the idea of celebrating Father’s Day on an annual basis.

There are then certain worldrenowned personalities in various sectors that have a strong link and association with the YMCA. Swimmer Mark Spitz, former President Bill Clinton, boxers Rocky Marciano and Lennox Lewis, and the Reverend Martin Luther King are just to mention a few.

My final appeal, therefore, is for all of us to be aware of the immense good that the YMCA does within the Maltese society and to keep in mind the enormous funds that this organization has to necessarily fork out to keep and improve on all those benefits to our country. They really depend on charity, and if we do not have any charity in our hearts, then we really have the worst kind of heart trouble. The work of the young and not so young volunteers within the Maltese YMCA impacts all our lives, even if we are not aware of it.

“YMCA has been operating since 1976 in Malta with specific programmes, services, and projects for the vulnerable sections of our society. And to do that YMCA is all the time dependent on support from all of us to join forces in raising essential and much-needed funds.”

Dr Mark Said is an advocate

A fundamental difficulty with a twoparty parliamentary system like the Maltese is that the majority dictates all the rules, where the winner takes it all as the Civil Court, First Hall, has recently observed

It also develops another phenomenon – the arrogance of power. Those in power think that than can run away with practically everything under the sun. And in Malta this is not just a thought but a reality!

What actually happens in a duopoly where no coalition government exists is that the majority political party transforms itself into the government of the State. This, in reality, means that two out of three organs of the State – the legislature and government – end up controlled by the party in government. It also means that the civil service and other state entities are practically all political party controlled, bar a few exceptions here and there.

It is only the judicial organ that is no so controlled; but the judiciary does have its own problems that benefit government.

First, they take an eternity to give the citizen an effective and timely remedy and procedures are interminable: preliminary pleas, preliminary judgments, retrials, appeals, constitutional court references, etc.

Second, when they do arrive at a belated decision, the remedy is given only to the plaintiff who has requested it and, due to court delays, might end up ineffective. Other persons have to go through the whole process afresh to obtain the same remedy the previous plaintiff got and, in the absence of the doctrine of precedent, there is no guarantee that a new composition of the court will reach the same judgment as it can instead side with government rather than with plaintiff. Consistency in court judgments is not mandated as evidenced by conflicting judgments delivered by the same court.

Third, the public does not enjoy the faculty to enforce all the provisions of the Constitution through the courts because both the Constitution and the courts prohibit this except in limited cases such as when laws run counter to the Constitution or human rights actions. Even here there is a tortious road to traverse as, in the past, the Office of the Attorney General, and now the Office of the State Advocate, came or will come up with every possible imaginable preliminary delaying plea to nip the case in the bud before it can ever go to trial, let alone, judgment. In the absence of a general action afforded to the people to request the Constitutional Court to enforce the Constitution, the people end up – as the politicians want them – castrated.

The Opposition is nothing but a government in waiting. Once it manages to muster a majority, it continues from where the previous government would have left. Faces change, some policies might even change, but the new political party in government resumes the oppression of the minority. Further, the Opposition is not on a level playing field to the government and does not have an equal chance to get elected because of the power of incumbency that continues to prevail during the electoral campaign with the majority power as the caretaker government. The Opposition plays against the highest odds when all the stakes are in favour of the incumbent political party in government.

With an irrelevant Opposition and a lethargic judiciary, a twoparty parliamentary system produces nothing but tyranny. Of course, the state still retains a semblance of democracy. Parliament and the judiciary will continue to function and so will other independent public offices. But, in essence, it is very easy for government to control the independent public officers by either appointing its lackeys to key offices of the state, by not appointing none at all and leaving the public offices vacant for a certain period of time, by appointing those who are afraid of their own shadow, and by ignoring recommendations made by either independent bodies or by its own appointed boards and commissions.

Domestically, it is next to impossible to challenge government for it practically controls everything. The only way how to make it reason out things in the public interest and not in the political party in government interest is through foreign pressure and the independent media. I am not counting the people for their say is extremely limited: they exercise it only once every five years!

But the independent media does not have the necessary clout to stop government from perpetrating maladministration although they can, to a limited extent, make spokes in the government’s wheels. But even the media can be controlled through, for instance, costly libel actions and SLAPP actions, not providing them with access to vital information, inviting only a select few to press conferences, refusing to answer questions or be interviewed, offering journalists more lucrative and attractive positions with government, or cutting or limiting government advertisements to the press.

Foreign pressure, at times can be effective such as the grey listing by the FATF or the constitutional changes of 2020 that government had to pass, very reluctantly, through parliament, because of pressure put by the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, the Venice Commission, the European Union Parliament, the European Union Commission as well as other non-international state entities such as Transparency International, Article 19, Reporters without Borders, etc. Yet, although these initiatives might sometimes produce results, international organisations are not well versed in domestic affairs, would not know the exact details of the laws and procedures and how they are being circumvented by government, and sometimes even finish led by the nose. This apart from the fact that international organisations have no or limited coercive powers upon the political party controlling the whole machinery of government.

The question is: which majority political party is willing to curtail its own powers? The answer is quite obvious: none for the status quo benefits the majority political party and the minority party eyeing political power.

Conclusion: there is no justice in Malta – we are doomed to live under the tyranny of the majority political party in government, whichever one of the two it might be!

Kevin Aquilina is Professor of Law and the Faculty of Laws of the University of Malta

The arrival of the

in our shores earlier this week, is a massive boost for all

European fishing boats operating in the region

This patrol and inspection vessel from the European Fisheries Control Agency (EFCA), will indubitably play a key role in ensuring the safety and security of all Maltese fishermen during these summer months. However, there still remain several clouds over the horizon, as long-term security issues plaguing the region remain unaddressed.

The Lundy Sentinel is the result of three years of pressure and constant dialogue by the Maltese Government, through its representatives in the General Fisheries Committee for the Mediterranean. We had repeatedly stated how tensions in the Mediterranean had reached a critical stage, threatening the livelihood of our fishing industry and the sovereignty of our nation as a whole.

Local newspapers, including The Malta Independent, had published numerous stories on the threats faced by Maltese fishermen while out on the high seas. Both Tunisian and Libyan vessels were observed fishing without permission within Maltese waters. Numerous fishing aggregate devices (kanizzati) on the high seas were either poached or removed. A small number of these incidents even reported aggressive manoeuvring by these vessels and even threats of physical violence.

Fortunately, the European Union finally recognised the severity of the situation. The deployment of the Lundy Sentinel will act as a shield for all Maltese and European fishermen who act responsibly and within the confines of the law. This vessel, manned by both European and Maltese inspectors, will have the power to inspect both local and foreign vessels. It will also provide logistical support to any vessel in the neighbouring area, especially during an emergency.

I cannot, however, mention this initiative without publicly lauding the efforts by the Armed Forces of the Malta during these past years. Not only have they been responsible for providing logistical and emergency aid to our fishermen in need, but they have been constantly on the forefront, protecting our Maltese waters against foreign incursions by