I am impressed with the efforts of some Labour supporters in their attempt to defend the indefensible in relation to Minister Mizzi's involvement in the Panamagate scandal. Their efforts include trying to shift the issue into the realm of the irrelevant. These old school Labour diehards are trying to shift the issue to the question of whether Minister Mizzi has lied or not. Well, frankly, whether he lied or not is totally irrelevant. What is relevant, significant and totally unacceptable is the simple fact that a government minister (and a “socialist” minister at that), entrusted with key portfolios such as Health and Energy that are particularly exposed to the risk of corruption, should set himself and his family up with a means to amass wealth away from his home country, and away from the scrutiny of his country's tax authorities.

The key words here are “... a means to amass...” He may or may not have hidden away any wealth, and I understand that fact has not been established yet, but even if he did not, it is certainly not because he did not have the means to do so, which then begs the question: why did he set up this financial labyrinth in the first place? Apart from the question of whether the minister has lied or not, or indeed whether he has broken the law or not, the fundamental question is whether Minister Mizzi is guilty or not guilty of betraying the trust of his electorate (his socialist supporters in particular) and that of the people of Malta by revealing himself to be dangerously embroiled in such an embarrassing mess; and might I add particularly embarrassing for an exponent of “socialist” ideology. One does not have to be particularly clever and objective notwithstanding being staunchly “either side of” partisan to reach the conclusion that Minister Mizzi is guilty of such betrayal.

Quite apart from the defence of Minister Mizzi however, what I find particularly worrying is the fact that under the circumstances, this saga does not seem to be going in one of only two possible directions for such scandals in truly democratic societies. The alternatives are: i) the minister resigns from all political appointments, including his seat in Parliament and disappears from the political scene, never to return, and, in the event that alternative (i) is not freely pursued by the minister, ii) diplomatically or otherwise, the minister is invited to resign, or forced to resign.

Such course of action is owed to the people of Malta who certainly deserve better. It is owed to those genuine socialists who will undoubtedly be scandalized by the anti-socialist behaviour of a minister who is supposed to represent them, and finally it is owed to the Labour diehards who must be going through a process akin to inflicting self-harm in their Herculean task of defending an unworthy exponent of the party they support who really should have known better and who, probably unlike them, is laughing all the way to the bank.

 

Alan Muscat

Borgofranco d'Ivrea

Italy