San Moratti has been relatively silent over the last few days. Probably mulling his next moves on how to make Juventus spend another couple of years in Serie B since his team seem to be returning to the normal place in the championship – the one they are used to: beneath Juventus. Meanwhile Uncle Fester Galliani has been trying to silence Juventus’ DG Marotta who dared point out that Milan were getting more favourable interpretations than Juventus in certain circumstances. Galliani might have to worry about other problems away from the pitch. There’s even more evidence that, like Moratti’s Inter-cettati, Galliani’s Devilish fingers also behaved in much the same manner as those who were sent to pay for whatever sins were invented in Serie B.
Here’s a phone call between Galliani and Meani:
L’INTERCETTAZIONE – Ecco la telefonata Meani-Ramaccioni- Galliani del 3 aprile 2005 ore 12.07 sullo slittamento per la morte del Papa: se ne parla, ma senza molti particolari sul braccio di ferro di potere con Moggi e Capello nell’informativa del 21 gennaio 2006 e senza evidenziare il ruolo assunto dal Milan nella vicenda.
Meani. Ciao Silvano ( Ramaccioni, il team manager, ndr) sono Leonardo. Allora cosa han fatto? Hanno fatto slittare il campionato, allora, praticamente Ramaccioni. Sì, Sì Se vuoi ti passo il presidente, te lo passo. E’ slitatto.
Galliani: Leonardo?
M: Dottore?
G. Allora abbiamo slittato, giochiamo sabato alle 20.30, anzi alle 18 col Brescia, poi domenica andiamo Siena.
M. Senza Kakà senza l’altro
G. Ma secondo lei io dormo?
M. No
G. Lei pensa che io dormo, ma porca troia. Anche perché quel figlio di puttana di Moggi, le racconto: Moggi, che è un figlio di puttana, faccio sentire anche a Costacurta così si carica. Ha pure chiamato Preziosi ( e gli ha detto) Adriano l’ha fatto apposta così recupera i sudamericani, c’hanno Shevchenko che sta meglio, hanno spostato di una settimana. Con l’Inter ce l’abbiamo già. Dopo pensiamo a quelli di Torino l’abbiamo già sistemata perché l’accoppiata Moggi- Capello è?
M. : E’ micidiale?
G. : Come Capello- Sensi, via Capello, Sensi è tornato amico. L’abbiamo purgato già l’anno scorso ( la Roma di Capello perse lo sprint scudetto col Milan, ndr), lo purghiamo anche quest’anno ( allenando la Juve, ndr). Fa niente ( ride). Capito Leonardo. E’ pieno di uccelli padu-li, se non tiri le corde, non capiscono?
M: Anche se ho visto che nel sorteggio gli è saltato fuori Collina ( arbitrerà Fiorentina- Juve 3- 3 del 10 aprile 2005, ndr): e ciò è positivo.
G. : Tranquillo, vigilare su tutto.
Dopo il celeberrimo Siena- Milan 2- 1 la telefonata Meani- Galliani del 19 aprile 2005 in cui Galliani dimostra di sapere bene quale sarà il futuro della Can.
Galliani: Ha parlato con qualcuno dei due ex designatori?
Meani: Dio bono, altro che parlato. Non ha visto che in macchina c’era Ancelotti e gli bestemmiavo parolacce, e Ancelotti mi fa: ma che cosa gli dici.
G. A chi?
M. A Bergamo e Mazzei, perché Pairetto è in Germania
G. : E che dicono questi signori?
M. : Si cagano addosso: frasi di circostanza? “ chi va a pensare un errore del genere da uno così ( Baglioni, ndr)”. Con una squadra come il Milan a un minimo dubbio si sta giù con la bandiera, non si va su a vanvera. Questa è gente che non è preparata psicologicamente. Cosa vi preoccupate più del Palermo? Ha visto la designazione? Ci mandano persino Puglisi ( amicissimo di Meani, ndr). Adesso, gli ho detto, vietato sbagliare e vietato sbagliare dall’altra parte ( della Juve, ndr), nel senso contrario però. Questo è un periodo pericolosissimo.
G. : Lo so, lo so.
M.: Anche perché lui mi fa: siete andati in vantaggio lo stesso? ( dopo l’annullamento del gol di Sheva, il Milan segnerà con Crespo l’ 1- 0, ndr). Gli ho detto: comincia a darmi il mio gol. Dottore, ha parlato ieri con Collina ( con cui doveva parlare segretamente per un futuro da designatore: ricordiamo che allora per la scelta del designatore serviva il placet del presidente di Lega, Galliani, ndr)? La cercava.
G. : No.
M. : Guardi che la chiamerà.
G. : Adesso, lo cerco io.
Un Mangia Mangia generale… altro che Moggiopoli. Vada via i ciap! Milanesi di mer…..
Austin is preparing his swan song. He told Herman Grech of the Times that he has been doing so since the results of the last election were announced at the counting hall. It may be so but the fact that Austin feels that it is time to say goodbye and “enjoy his wife” does not suddenly give this Minister the license to take us all for a ride – whether or not he is the transport minister. J’accuse has often had words of praise for the Thatcherite resilience of Minister Gatt who seemed to get things done in areas were even devils feared to thread but as readers well now our criticism is equanimously balanced.
The two-part interview available on the Times contains a couple of “whoa” moments that might be an indication that notwithstanding ministerial claims otherwise, the Time to Say Goodbye might also be linked to the danger of Gatt’s decreasing capability of squirming out of hot issues.
First there are the questions on the parliamentary cock-up by the PN regarding the possibility of listening to witnesses on the BWSC question. Gatt is adamant that parliamentary procedure does not offer sufficient protection to witnesses who might incriminate themselves. Weird. Weird because, as Herman points out, Gatt had no such qualms for the Voice of the Med investigation. Weird because different political weight of the two issues is absolutely no excuse for not proceeding in the same manner for the second. Weirder still because Gatt is a member of the House of Representatives – a house that would be performing its duty if it were to investigate whether or not public monies have been subject of corrupt activities. Gatt is not the advocate for any of the witnesses and is in no way duty bound to protect them. Is Gatt aware that he actually stated that the witnesses are not protected from self-incrimination when bearing witness before the parliament? One should hope that if there is something incriminating about their behaviour then it would be in everybody’s interest that that behaviour were to be discovered (and not sheltered).
Then there’s the point of parliamentary procedure. Gatt has been serving his country since 1976 and feels it is time to retire and enjoy more worldly matters than the business of parliament. Is it possible that in all that time he did not notice this lacuna and move for a law that remedies the situation. Parliamentary democracies in the UK, US, Italy, France etc are used to examining witnesses within their legislative assemblies. It is rather sorry of a member of government to practically compare the safety of our parliament to some interrogation in Basra that could result in self-incrimination.
As for comparative studies, when Gatt is asked about the discriminatory fees in the transport system he rolls off the names of a number of city transport systems that – according to him – discriminate between residents and non-residents. He asks us to do the homework. So we do.
London:
Oyster Card: You go to the visitorshop (click here)and you can order an Oystercard delivered to your home in Malta prior to your visit to the UK. Once in London you can top up the card and use it just like any other London resident and at the same rates.
Notwithstanding the fact that “By one measure—single ticket price for a 10-km (6.2 mi) journey—Stockholm has the most expensive-to-use public transport in the world, as of March 2009” – there is no discrimination between residents and non-residents on Stockholm public transport. A quick tour of the Wikipedia site for Ticket Prices in Stockholm would have given Dr Gatt that answer.
Helsinki :
Same as Stockholm. The advantages you can get in Helsinki are obtained by buying Travel Cards instead of single-fare tickets. It’s an obvious mode of discrimination that J’accuse has already pointed out but it is a discriminatory choice for the consumer and not based on the nature of the consumer. Read about it here (God bless Wikipedia).
Talinn is the only one of the cities mentioned by Dr Gatt that does discriminate between residents and non-residents. With all due respect to Talinn it was rather, how shall I say, unusual for that city to be thrown in within the list. You’d expect a cocksure Minister to say “Hey, London, Paris, Barcelona, Rome, Brussels and Amsterdam” discriminate against non-residents. I guess Talinn has been bandied around as an example by Austin’s advisors. So I did not just look at Wikipedia (article here – the article does include the following unequivocal statement: Ticket prices for non-resedentials of Tallinn are more expensive than stated above!) this time – I asked an Estonian blogger- Andrei Tuch – about this scheme. Here’s the reply:
J’accuse: Would you know if city transport systems in Talinn (buses/rail/etc) actually discriminate between residents and non-residents when charging fares?
Andrei (antyx): Yes, they do. Tallinn has a populist mayor who wanted to isolate his supporter base, bribe them with benefits. At one point the scheme was blocked because it was judged to be unconstitutional (nobody must be discriminated based on residence), but right now the scheme does operate. You can see the prices here.
There you have it Dr Gatt. Three out of four of the cities you quoted actually do not discriminate between residents and non-residents. It turns out that Talinn’s scheme was judged unconstitutional (not even at EU stage but national stage) and is only the result of “a populist minister isolating his supporter base”.
Time to say goodbye? Maybe. Just maybe.
UPDATE:
In case we get accused of biased reporting. J’accuse sent a query to the Talinn City Government with regards to the question of different fares. Here is their prompt reply:
Dear mr Zammit,
There is a slight difference between the prices for electronical periodic cards for the city of Tallinn residents and non residents.
Prices for non residents are approximately 15-18% higher than prices for residents.
There are no price differences among the single tickets and hourly tickets (paper tickets).
Different prices for the city residents and non residents have been in force from the 1st of February 2010.
Please find all the ticket prices from the pricelist which you can find at:
Gareth Compton, Conservative councillor for Erdington in Birmingham (UK), was released on bail on the eve of Armistice Day after he was arrested for an offence under the Communications Act of 2003 on suspicion “of sending an offensive or indecent message”. Compton was questioned about the content of a Tweet of his which read: “Can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death? I shan’t tell Amnesty if you don’t. It would be a blessing, really.”
Compton argued that this was “an ill-conceived attempt at humour in response to Alibhai-Brown saying on Radio 5 Live that no politician had the right to comment on human rights abuses – even the stoning of women in Iran”. Tories and Labourites in the West Midlands joined the chorus of disapproval aimed at Compton’s ill-judged tweet and the police moved in with the charge.
In another corner of the UK, Doncaster Crown Court rejected Paul Chambers’ appeal against a Magistrates Court decision that had found him guilty of “sending a menacing electronic communication”. Chambers’ case also involved a tweet. This time the tweet was angrily directed to nearby Robin Hood Airport. With the airport shut down because of snow and Chambers’ travel plans thus thwarted, the tweeter vented his frustration to his 600-odd followers on the micro-blogging site: “Crap! Robin Hood Airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!”
Tough Guy (now recant)
Judge Jacqueline Davies of the Crown Court was not impressed by the defendant’s argument of “just kidding”. In her words, “We find it impossible to accept that anyone living in this country, in the current climate of terrorist threats, would not be aware of the consequences of their actions in making such a statement.” Both Compton and Chambers tried to write off the relative weight of their statement by claiming that their actions were performed in jest. There might be a substantial difference between a politician inviting people to stone a journalist on the one hand and a private individual venting his frustration in a colourful manner in another, but at the end of the day the lesson to be learnt is to be very careful when venturing into the world of mass communication. That iPhone at your fingertips can land you in deep do-do indeed.
I get the impression that Malta is still not sufficiently hooked on Twitter to provide this kind of interesting legal twist. The chronicles of court affairs are choking with the facts of intra-familial battles raging from the ballistic nose-breaking prodigies of one husband, to the wife who claimed that her husband was obsessed with an Italian late-night show over 20 years after it had gone off air. There are no tweeting offences as yet and while the Plategate saga rolls on in the background of the trendier chronicles, the battles in communication are taking place in more conventional fora – such as The Times letter pages.
When I first heard of Prime Minister Gonzi’s foray into the murky waters of The Times letter pages correspondence, I thought I’d give it a miss. Egged on by others, I finally got round to reading the prime ministerial letter – signed by the Prime Minister himself. Apparently Dr Gonzi had not liked a particular missive by a certain Bonett Balzan (BB for short) that had appeared in the pages of His Master’s Voice the previous Saturday. Dr Gonzi seemed intent on making a couple of points: firstly that he is not an “ends justifies the means” kind of guy (so no Luxol Grounds last-minute backstab on political allies from him, I guess); and secondly, he issued what I describe on the blog as a sort of fatwa from the head of our constitutionally Catholic state.
Here are his words: “I condemn all hatred expressed in all circumstances and reiterate my appeal to all concerned to keep political language within the bounds of what should be acceptable in a mature democratic society.” The question everyone (not to be confused with Everybody) was asking was: What prompted this letter?
Sure Shot
(political communication)
And you couldn’t blame “everyone” in the end. After reading Dr Gonzi’s letter, I had to look for the letter that had triggered the reaction by the head of government. Dr Gonzi had quoted from the offending letter and specified what had caused him to take offence. The Prime Minister stated that he took particular offence at the phrase “taken of the law into his own hands with fatal consequences”. Prima facie it seemed like a rather harsh phrase – one that would have any spoudaios (Gk. – average man) rushing to his desk and typing a measured response.
It all went kind of sour when I read the context from which the phrase was lifted. There was nothing remotely injurious in fact. True, BB’s letter was astonishingly similar to much of the crap that passes for intelligent discussion on blog comment boards nowadays. It was an illustration of anything but the “enlightened times” that were referred to in the letter and its author is a perfect example of conservative, ignorant bigotry that has become common fare in most discussions.
Having said that, the whole bit about the taking of judicial matters into one’s own hands with dire consequences was actually part of a description of the habitual goings on among husbands and adulterers. Bonett Balzan was simply illustrating how adulterers would have been treated a while back, before the enlightened times of this government “ably led” by “the job-creating” Dr Gonzi (BB’s words). Yes, Bonett Balzan does come out as a fervent (never a more apt term) follower of the GonziPN creed – he is, in fact, appalled at the dilution of its values by upstarts such as JPO.
Put fairly and squarely, Bonett Balzan’s letter was no less of an abuse of the freedom of expression as that exercised by the myriad liberated voices that populate Internet comment boards every day of the week. Why then had the Gonzi-radar zoomed in on this particular manifestation of not-so-illuminated literary intervention in order to vent the prime ministerial fury? There was only one explanation. Dr Gonzi might be a professed anti-divorcist, but he will not take kindly to being automatically associated with the Maltese version of redneck backwaters. It was in such a spirit that the prime ministerial letter was penned and to such a letter was appended a glorious appendix.
For the Gonzi letter ended in a blanket condemnation of hatred expressed in all circumstances, as well as an appeal to maintain a decent level of political discourse. We’d have loved to applaud this noble initiative had it not jarred with the fact that the intervention (“scendere in campo” as Berlusconi is wont to say) was too isolated and seemed to ignore other more serious and more prominent offenders who have contributed to the general debasement of political discourse. The selective lifting of dubiously offensive quotations only served to water down the import of Dr Gonzi’s letter – leading to the incredulous reaction from the nation’s cognoscenti.
Get It Together (please)
Ill communication was not monopolised by the Office of the Prime Minister. It’s getting tiring to follow the concerted practice (that’s the second anti-trust term in this paragraph) of political acolytes of the Labourite persuasion in drumming their various stories home on the basis of “fairness”. “Mhux fjer” (not fair) has been translated into a political mantra and the Labour monks are busy exposing their hurts (“wegghat”) and the levels of unfairness with every political development on the political scene.
Chief Economist Muscat led the way last week with his budget reactions. This week we had the story of the 1,000 Air Malta employees declared surplus to requirements according to a report. Tony Zarb and most PL-leaning commentators were busy preparing wailing laments for the thousand family members on whose sweat, blood and tears the success story that is Air Malta had been created, only to be given a hint of the exit (and I am not talking Safety Exits here) at this moment of economic uncertainty.
“Mhux fjer” they yelled. Who will love their children? Which is OK for a trade union leader, but not OK for a political party that should be planning our way out of whatever mess they seem to be oh so keen to highlight. If there is a mess, and I am not saying that there isn’t, the role of an opposition party is not to highlight the problem but to confidently claim and prove that it has a solution at hand.
The communication lines of the new PL seem to be built with a very short-term goal in mind. They tend to ignore the fact that once in government the exposure of the ills, pains and injustices of society will not suffice, and that people will actually expect them to deliver the goods. I quizzed some Labour supporters, asking what they would do if they found themselves at the head of a government that had just been presented with the 1,000-surplus workers report. The first reply? Ah, we would commission a report to find out who is responsible for the overstaffing of the airline. Bravo indeed. Now THAT is a great solution. Get ready for a headless government that blames its shortfalls on the 2012 version of “il-hofra”. Progressive? Bah.
Sabotage (discrimination)
And then there was the communications cock-up, which was the announcement of the new bus fares once Arriva take over. What should have been the groundwork for a much-awaited new bus system ended up in bawling and exchanges on the media about the proposal to charge tourists a higher fare. Apart from this being the most pea-brained idea since Bush decided to publish his memoirs, the clumsy handling of the aftermath and backlash was mind-boggling.
We had a ministry spokesman (one of those) declaring that charging tourists more than the Maltese does not amount to discrimination. It was a case of knowing what he intended to say but also recognising what a cock-up the actual statement was. The whole point of discrimination is of creating criteria that turns like into unlike. Here was a ministry spokesman who was claiming that charging two rates for the same trip would not be discrimination. But it is, dear spokesman. The words he was looking for was justified discrimination because under EU law there are instances where discrimination can be justified if reasonably argued.
Which is where Minister Gatt piped in with the whole notion of resident v non-resident. Residents, it seems, are eligible for a subsidised fare because they pay taxes. Non-residents (tourists) don’t. Really? What was that tax increase in the last budget? Who pays it? Residents? Or tourists? There’s no knowing when the politicians of this world will come up with the next blooper that’s the size of a BWSC contract investigation gone wrong. (Bravo Parliament incidentally).
All that the men at the Ministry of Transport had to do was look at public transport systems worldwide. Take London’s Oystercard. There is no discrimination on the basis of residence. The only discrimination is the usual justified discrimination in favour of seniors and students. Other than that you pay according to how much you use it. Most travel cards give you more benefits the longer the validity. This is based on the basic assumption that a resident (frequent user) will, more often than not, take long-term credit on his card (a one-year travel card) to benefit from the lower price that would ensue in normal offers on a normal market.
Tourists are not precluded from buying a one-year travel-card but it would not make sense economically. Instead they will probably opt for a seven- or three-day card. A resident could buy that card but it does not pay him as much as a yearly card. You see? No discrimination on the basis of residence or nationality that has to be justified on the basis of some spurious taxation excuse. Instead you have a scaled system of cards accessible to all but that actually makes sense for different categories – the only discrimination is in the consumer’s mind at the moment of purchase. Who am I kidding? I am sure the guys at Arriva know all this and will soon be showing the way on this matter.
Roots Down (travel)
Speaking of travel, I will be in Versailles this weekend – a birthday treat from my better half. In that palace lived a woman who never actually uttered the fabled words “Let them eat cake”. It’s just so unfair that sometimes it is the words that are unsaid that end up making the biggest noise.
www.akkuza.com From the Hall of Mirrors to Le Petit Trianon, all in a weekend’s work. Titles of this week’s article (barring brackets) brought to you courtesy of the great Beastie Boys album “Ill Communication” (1994).
JPO is happily heading a coalition of sorts that will campaign for the introduction of divorce. While it is definitely encouraging that persons from both sides of the parliamentary divide can join with social powers that have been stonewalled out of the institution thanks to the PLPN rules it would seem that the very participants are blissfully unaware of how this IVA business can turn into a great deception.
It is one thing to form a movement that lobbies for the introduction of divorce and another to choose a slogan that is an evident throwback to the referendum moments pre-EU accession. I am sure that I will be called the eternal cynic in this respect and that the excuse that “some effort is better than no effort at all ” will be thrown back at me in full force but the advocates of this new IVA movement should be made aware of the constitutional (and marketing) pitfalls of their arrangement.
By orienting their movement to a referendum style formation the IVA for divorce group has already conceded valuable ground in the battle for the introduction of the divorce. They are virtually admitting that this will have to be a majority decision in the form of a referendum and/or consultation of the people. They are allowing the parties in parliament to do what they do best – i.e. abdicate from any responsibility of legislating for divorce as they should have done decades ago.
Instead JPO & friends give the impression of being much more interest in the limelight afforded by this discussion than by the actual force of their argument. Divorce is not a majority question. The Bonnett Balzans of this world may come back at divorce arguments with the fire and brimstone philosophy but the endline in a normal democracy operating in normal conditions would be for the parliament to legislate and allow for a legal possibility that has long been missing in our juridical system.
Instead we have IVA. And IVA to what? As we have pointed out previously under Maltese law we do not have a propositive referendum. Should we have a referendum on the matter that would probably come AFTER parliament introduces a law on divorce – because our law allows for abrogative referenda: a referendum asking the people whether they want to abrogate (cancel, annull, remove) a law that has been enacted. In which case the answer for the IVA movement should be LE (no, I do not want the divorce law removed) and not IVA. Quite a quandary no?
But of course the PLPN will play along with the whole idea of a consultative referendum. It pays them because they can blame “the people” for whatever decision is taken in the case of divorce. We might have JPO & friends to thank for any eventual cock up…
Take a quick tour of the written and spoken media on the Maltese islands and you notice that such linguistic delicacies as “dutchboard” and “spartan plug” (dashboard and sparking plug) are not exclusive to the stereotypical “hamallu” that first springs to mind. One of the most painful recurrences on Facebook is the word that people insist on spelling as “definAtely”. There’s definitely no “A” in definitely. When it comes to TV the word that really jars – in Maltese – is the Maltese name for England. I’ve heard both Peppi Azzopardi and the guy who presents Realtà on One TV refer to l-INGRITERRA that sounds like some talcum powder for Ingrid.
It’s Ingilterra. I’m sure Peppi and Realtà guy don’t say l-INGRIZI. What would that be? The in-people wearing gray? Both Peppi and Realtà guy seem to also be intent on killing the word “insurance”. I am quite sure that “INXJURINS” pains others and not just me… have you heard of any other words being massacred lately? Share please.
