Tag: Taghna Lkoll

Categories
Politics

Unmeritocracy, Undemocracy

undemocracy_akkuza2

So it turns out that Mario Philip Azzopardi is not the most congenial person to work with. And that, it seems, is putting it mildly. It is ironic that of all the “meritocratic” appointments under the present government it is Azzopardi who joins the magisterial nominees in the eye of the storm(s) currently being whipped up. Azzopardi proudly boasts of being the man behind the infamous “I’m not sorry pa, I’m voting Labour” campaign that epitomises the drivel that was sold by Muscat’s campaign team before the election.  Muscat’s Labour was sold as an all-encompassing movement that would radicalise politics in Malta and take the heavy burden of nationalist arrogance and mismanagement off the Maltese people. The (man who thinks he is) Obama from Bahrija managed to pull off the biggest trick with a sufficient amount of people having swallowed his well packaged drivel hook, line and sinker.

Almost three years of Taghna Lkoll government later the masks have completely washed off (might have been the ice bucket challenge) and any pretence that this government harbours any values that relate to anything remotely resembling meritocracy (one of the trumpet calls of the campaign) have been dispelled. The crisis of this government is in fact first and foremost based around its abject failure to hold up the one principle that shone above all during the campaign : meritocracy.

The arts community is now up in arms because the man appointed as V18 artistic director has reached the limit of yellow cards. In an article in the Times today we find the very dangerous allegation that Azzopardi flaunted his political links in order to pressure artists into collaborating with him. Does it stop with Azzopardi? Of course not. He cannot be made the scapegoat of a virus that has been injected into the whole fabric of our institutional make-up. Take the issue of “persons of trust” for example. Only a couple of days ago our PM was happy-tweeting the fact that the employment rate in Malta was such that 18 persons a day have found employment under this government – of which 80% are in the private sector. Which might sound good but it also carries the interesting fact that under Muscat 4 people a day have been appointed to the public service.

Every week. While Michelle Muscat burns an inordinately ridiculous amount of diesel, and while Joseph Muscat cashes in 144 euros for renting his valueless Alfa to himself, 28 new employees join our government’s wage bill. Most of those, it goes without saying, are employed as “persons of trust” – a twisted interpretation of constitutional principles that is only there to justify one simple point: You Have to Be Labour to Be Trusted. I’m sorry pa.

Does it stop there? Hell not it doesn’t. This week the leader of the Opposition tweeted that the ball is now in the President’s court with regards to the nomination of Farrugia Frendo as a magistrate. New doubts have been raised (and echoed) from different quarters – retired judges, the dean of the law faculty and the Chamber of Advocates as to the eligibility of Farrugia Frendo for the post. Since Justice Minister Owen Bonnici insists on going ahead with the nomination anyway without consulting the Commission for Administration of Justice Busuttil has reasoned that the only guarantor of the consitution that is left is the President. All this is happening when we were supposed to be facing a monumental and uplifting reform in the justice sector – pivotal among which was an improved method of judicial appointment.

Instead of the promised reform we risk a patchwork re-evaluation based on knee-jerk reactions that are in their turn fruit of the current set of circumstances. The judicial reform cannot be the result of such a knee-jerk reaction. Especially not the reform of judicial appointments. A well-thought out reform has to fit in to the general fabric of constitutional discourse – that very discourse that has long been tainted by partisan rivalry and hijacked by hapless interventions that deprive it of all form of objectivity.

The lack of meritocracy is in fact the virus that has terminally poisoned this government and with it the it has gone on and poisoned the very institutional and constitutional fabric of the state. Democracy is in danger. I say these words not with the lightness of the kind that is normally around when campaign slogans are coined. Democracy is really in danger when what is unfolding before us is a general legal and political remake of the institutional fabric but one that is in the hand of power-serving, power-loving and power-hungry incompetents. This kind of reform that has gone by monikers such as Second Republic or Constitutional Change and that was supposedly heralded with the arrival of the Taghna Lkoll Politics is one that is only dedicated to as much self-preservation as possible for as long as possible by a select  circle of individuals who found themselves at the centre of society through a series of coincidental events.

It is dangerous. It is the triumph of ignorance and greed. It is happening right here, right now.

 

Categories
Corruption

Cardona’s Meritocracy

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“Nahseb ghandu dritt dan il-guvnott.” There they go again. Economy Minister Chris Cardona tried to ward off questions related to the appointment of Karl Cutajar (an 18 year old) to head the board of Fort Security Services – a newly set up government company. The controversy has raged for a few days now, especially since it has featured on Malta’s version of Wikileaks quite extensively (spreading to other relatives of Cardona’s Chief of Staff) so you’d expect the Minister to be better prepared to fend off questions.

Well, he is either not prepared or he is ignorant of the goings on under his watch. Just wait for some idiot to come and tell us that so long as Cardona has no “mens rea” then its ok.  They’ll tell us that notwithstanding the fact that the answers given by Cardona when “cornered” by the press with very legitimate set of questions smack of anything but a meritocratic approach to public appointments we must assume that he is cleaner than Caesar’s Wife.

As it happens judging by Cardona’s reply we have the following facts:

1. An 18 year old was employed by MIMCOL as an executive clerk (which could be quite ok – and is where the buck stops with “ghandu dritt dan il-guvnott”);

2. The 18 year old has been placed at the head of Fort Security Services which is a company that will be taking care of security on sites where the government is winding down operations such as Malta Shipbuilding;

3. His job on the board is not remunerated;

4. The best one – there will probably not be any persons employed by Fort Security Services so it’s anyone guess whether the 18 year old Cutajar will be doing all the night watching on his own (sans remuneration);

5. It is a complete and utter coincidence that the eighteen year old put at the head of a one-man security company sans remuneration is the nephew of the chief of staff of the minister under who’s remit the very same company falls.

There you have it. We have moved far beyond the “Ceci n’est pas une pipe” days. The denial of the patently obvious (tmeri is-sewwa maghruf) is now becoming a day-to-day business at the Taghna Lkoll factory. Never, never-ever has this amount of patent disregard of meritocracy while abusing the government appointments system reached these levels.

Taghna Lkoll indeed.

“Jghodd mhux dak illi taf imma lil min taf”.

Categories
Politics

Marlene: The Real Taghna Lkoll

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I’ve tuned into the parliamentary sessions a few times ever since the new parliament has been inaugurated. It is rarely a pleasant experience and I do not delude myself with expectations of high oratory and rhetoric. Still, the PQ sessions provide a very good picture of what our politicians are up to and the respect with which most of them hold the highest institution of our nation. It was during one particularly ugly PQ session involving a cat-and-mouse session with the PN trying to get answers from an absent Konrad Mizzi that I was once again pleasantly surprised with an intervention by Marlene Farrugia, Labour MP.

Following a particularly cringe-causing exchange where it was evident that the Labour MPs were all out to avoid answering any form of questions no matter how they were phrased, Farrugia stood up and started to speak. The way her intervention began led me to believe it would be more of the same partisan pot and kettle talk. “I’ve sat through previous legislatures watching the previous Ministers and MPs dodging answers to questions and failing to be accountable”, she began. Was Marlene about to justify the government MP’s attitude with a classic ‘Tu quoque’ intervention?

Not really. “I’d expected our newly elected government with its promise of transparency and accountability to be different” she continued. Now there was a politician worth her salt. Marlene was not defending the Labour MP’s economy with the truth – she was criticising them, and precisely because they were doing nothing to improve the situation inherited from the previous lot even though they had been elected to do just that.

To me that intervention embodies all that Marlene Farrugia represents. She is a living proof of the politicians of real change. Oftentimes she is wrongly placed in the same category as the Franco Debono’s and Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando’s of this world – renegade, unhappy backbenchers who are trying to get more from their party while it is in power. Party faithfuls do not miss a beat when insulting and remind “why she was elected”. Yet Farrugia does not seem to aspire to power as much as to a kind of politics that is rare – real accountability, real transparency and a real change from the past.

Part of the charm of the Taghna Lkoll message for many during last election was the promise to break away from the old way of doing politics. This meant doing away with deals brokered with friends and friends of friends, it meant an open, transparent and meritocratic system. Had JosephPL stuck to the Taghna Lkoll promises it would not be in the dire situation it is now – a situation that might not be reflected in the opinion polls yet but that is evidently paving the way for electoral disaster.

Farrugia’s constant questioning of Labour’s performance is not based on a renegade development suddenly sprung on the party leadership. Rather she is the stronger version of the conscience that should remind the leadership, the party and the government of its democratic commitments to society. Is all this done out of some Macchiavellian manoeuvering? Does Farrugia hope to unseat the current leadership? Is her aim to destabilise the Labour party’s majority? As things stand it is very doubtful whether any of these options are possible or whether they are actually a priority in the outspoken MP’s mind. What is clear is that by sticking to values and committing to the most basic of electoral charters of accountability that is the party’s own manifesto and promises Farrugia towers strongly over the rest of the Labour MPs.

Until now Muscat has been able to ‘tolerate’ Farrugia’s outspokenness, also because he can scarcely do otherwise. If, as we hope, Farrugia remains steadfastly consistent in her commitment to a code of values that seems to have been ditched by the labour mainstream upon election the situation might become more and more uncomfortable. The main reason is that there is a limit to the number of gaffes that can be committed without the accountability.

Muscat’s nine lives might still be in full swing but Marlene Farrugia remains a wonderful reminder of what Taghna Lkoll would have been and could have been had it not been hijacked by power hungry opportunists who fail to understand or respect the liberal democratic system of accountability. Hers remains a tough task of civic education – particularly when it comes to imparting the lesson that having a majority does not automatically make everything right.

also read this: ‘This is not the Labour government we strived for’ – Marlene Farrugia urges ‘change in direction’

Categories
Politics

Labour’s Impropriety

impropriety_akkuza

The Taghna Lkoll apologists are beginning to cut quite a sorry figure during their online interventions. Their attempts to parrot the tu quoque arguments championed by their leader have become pathetic to say the least and the main reason is that this government’s actions all round have become indefensible. That this would happen was predictable from the start – too many cheques to cash, too many contradicting promises, too many mouths to feed and most of all (as we like to repeat) the glaring absence of a real political plan.

It is blatantly evident that the only road map Labour cares about is the one dotted with milestones and achievements that are only measured by how much money ends up lining the pockets of the Taghna Lkoll extended family. If there was a political plan in Joseph Muscat’s mind it was a short-term calculation that exploited the ugly deficiencies of our political system to the maximum. Muscat will have a place in history as he so crassly aspires – he will be remembered as the Prime Minister to have dragged our politics to the pits. I still cannot understand what kind of ambition can be driven by so much negativity – there is no apparent place for the real good of the people.

It is just there that the Labour government’s performance is at its worst. The complete and utter absence of consideration for the greater good of the nation. While words and spin are all about Taghna Lkoll, the good of the south, the new middle class and such similar claptrap the actions of the Labour government are those of one big plunderer intent on ransacking the public good as quickly as possible.

It does not stop or start at the ODZ – or even more particularly at Zonqor – it is a plunder that is happening step by step and eroding the institutions and heritage of our nation in much the same way woodworm will crawl and erode a fabulous bit of furniture from within. We have seen in the past few days how the Lands Department is practically run as a Labour appointee’s fiefdom allowing for undemocratic obscenities to be perpetrated.

That we get this kind of information from a blog that has had to assume the role of a kind of Wikileaks is very telling of the current state of affairs. The opposition is still hard at work to rebuild credibility thanks to the massive bombardment that it had suffered in the eye of the public. It cannot work in parliament because Labour treats parliament like a playground for despots – hiding behind petty and trumped up excuses in order to obfuscate the truth about its contracts and dealings. You only have to look at the Konrad Mizzi AWOL farce last week to see the way Labour treats its obligations of accountability to the nation’s supreme institution.

The first sign of voters’ anger and indignation is the increased stories being passed on to willing outlets of information. No matter how much noise the rent-a-privitera movement is making on the web you can feel that there is a growing counter-movement eager to throw light on the misdoings of the government and its friends. These angry voters might still not have understood the importance of activism and participation in the anti-ODZ development movement but are sufficiently angry to start asking questions and doing their bit by providing relevant information wherever they can.

Labour’s game has been uncovered because it necessarily dealt with property in many forms. Public good in the form of ODZ was the first area in which alarm bells started ringing. Muscat and his “what’s the fuss” attitude contributed to the acceleration of the denouement – citizens were finally seeing the careless attitude Muscat had with public property. It would have been bad enough were Muscat selling land to some reputable university, but when the mask finally fell that the land was being sold to Jordanian builders who had no previous experience in education it was a bit too much.

Meanwhile we are still dragging the power station saga with the government using public funds (also public property) to guarantee a loan to a private enterprise in order to get things going. That there are some people in some quarters trying to stir the tu quoque argument even in the light of this kind of proof is an indicator of how sick our politics has become.

As for Gaffarena Gate it is an eye opener (if one was still needed) as to what the effects of Taghna Lkoll politics are. We already had a race to mediocrity fuelled by alternation whereby the only point that counted in an electoral manifesto was the not being the other party. Taghna Lkoll threw in a strong dose of mediocrity plus with its army of incompetent appointees that are only bound to expose the ugly truth of this kind of short-term power politics.

It is now the PN’s duty to first and foremost document meticulously every faux pas of the Labour government – from its birth to the current almost daily gaffe-fest. It is also its duty to continue working on real change based on politics and values while trying to attract a new wave of politicians willing to sign up on that kind of ticket. It must be a ticket that does not fear the absence of compromises for the sake of gaining power. It must be a ticket that clearly states a program not just for tomorrow but for the future. It must be a program of building, creating and inventing. It must inspire confidence.

Labour’s government by impropriety must end.

 

 

Categories
Corruption Politics

Rotten to the core

rotten_akkuzaThe scandal relating to the concrete supply at Mater Dei Hospital is turning out to be a fitting metaphor to describe the fate of Maltese politics.

In the first instance we are gradually exposing an extremely deficient system that existed back in the mid-nineties that somehow or another allowed for the provision of sub-standard building materials for a hospital. Do not for one moment allow yourself to forget that it is a hospital that we are talking about. Along with schools, hospitals are probably one of the more socially sensitive infrastructures whose standard and quality mirror the heart of a nation -this is not to say that using deficient building material in order to construct any other type of building would have been a mitigation of any kind.

The formula for this horrible state of affairs is the tried and tested combination of commercial interests that work their way (either through influence or through direct involvement) into the corridors of power. The businessman and the politician will then work together to earn a quick buck on the backs of an electorate blinded by the passion for partisan flag-waving and alternation. The metaphor becomes ever more apt when one of the protagonists (shall we say suspects) turns out to be a career politician who managed to remain a sacred cow for one or other of the parties at different times in his career. No amount of irony was spared when his decade-spanning involvement in local (and now European and World) politics mean that somehow or other he was involved with the health structures of the nation under both parties in government.

But this is not about John Dalli. This is about the politics and political system of our nation. For I say that the metaphor remains apt to this day. Whether the guardians of the nation in the mid-nineties are to be found accountable for any corrupt sales of deficient construction material when building a new national hospital remains to be seen – what is sure is that someone has to pay. It will be another notch for the pro memoria of the twisted insanity of the post-Mintoffian generation of politicians.

What we have today is another government that is intent on hiding the truth or using parts of it to its gain. As of this month Muscat’s government is strongly testing the resilience of democratic sustainability and sovereignty. While the masks had fallen a long time ago, a long line of inexplicable decisions have provided clear hints that the Taghna Lkoll ideal has long been dead and buried and that Muscat has lost the plot.

It is hard to identify where it all began. Was it the full-frontal assault on the environment that did the trick? Was it the blatant lies relating to all that is Zonqor? Was it the slip relating to the Qala Yacht Marina? Muscat had tested the waters with the Hunting Referendum and wrongly gauged the slight victory obtained by those intent on preserving the status quo of wrongly appliying a European directive. Even today his appointees in the Ornis Committee defy all odds with relation to trapping. yet, Muscat’s defiant attitude on environmental issues is not a deal breaker on democratic standards. It is after all the prerogative of his party in government to espouse a suicidal destructive environmental policy.

No, the non-democratic chasm of Muscat lies away from these “minor” spites to our environmental heritage. It lies dotted within political appointments and appointees that are starting to betray their ineptness but still remain defended by the Prime Minister himself. It lies within a Cabinet Code of Ethics that has just been announced and that exposes Muscat’s money-hungry coterie for all its hypocrisy. It lies within the recent decisions relating to government property used to line the pockets of friends of friends (oh they are back but louder and clearer) from the Premier Cafe farce to the latest Gaffarena pot of gold.

It lies with the appointment of judges and magistrates in full defiance of the reforms that were being proposed by his very government. It lies with a “What’s all the fuss?” attitude combined with the “Tu Quoque” retorts that have long been dried of all significance and only serve to reinforce the strong perception of arrogance. It lies with the regular rubbing up to despots and tinpot country leaders and running around with a begging bowl while seemingly ignorant of the atrocities and democratic deficits that exist within the nations of these much adulated partners.

It lies with the belief that the national heritage and national identity is there solely for Labour’s politicians to plunder and sell to the highest bidder. With the passport scheme Muscat began to sell our mind and identity, with the lands that he has taken to expropriating, selling under cost, or plundering from their natural value he is selling our body and heritage, as for our soul, it has long been sold to the first devil to turn up at our doorstep promising Muscat a bit of money, an investment for his developer friends and a photo opportunity in which to prance around like some latter-day Mussolini on speed.

It’s a disgusting state of affairs in which nothing is sacred – not even the institutions that should stand as a guarantee. Under a nationalist government the faulty concrete foundations were laid at Mater Dei Hospital. At the same time the rotten core of all that is wrong in our political system had begun to take root. Today we find ourselves the inheritors of a hospital that is unsafe and of a government at the helm of a political system that is ready to implode any minute.

Joseph Muscat’s Labour has its hands deeply tied and entwined with the same kind of businessmen as existed in the mid-nineties and set the path for the Mater Dei disaster. It is beyond redemption. Hope, if any, lies first of all in Simon Busuttil and his managing the re-foundation of the nationalist party before going on to re-found the Maltese State. It must be patently obvious by now that the nationalist party needs a reconstruction from the roots and not simply a renewal. A new style of politics, a new style of engagement and a new style of leadership.

Speaking at Zonqor Busuttil did say that the biggest task for his party is not to be different from Muscat but also to be different from his own party in the past.

Those words should be printed out on a concrete slab at the entrance of PN HQ. Preferably on good, sound concrete… sound enough to build the basis for a brighter future ahead.

 

 

Categories
Mediawatch

Shooting the Red Cross

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The internet side of the Maltese world seems to be unanimous in its disapproval of the design for the Monti stalls. Some government “perit” was commissioned to ‘design’ these stalls that will be placed in the open space between the new parliament building and the open theatre in Valletta. The designs had barely been announced ad urbi et orbi that everyone and his brother became an expert design critic and a fully qualified assessor for the use of materials in open spaces. You did not even have time to shake off the suspicion that much of the noise being made came from the same quarters who had only a while back massacred anything that was labelled Piano, the anger at the flimsy designs was an uncontrollable tsunami. It was so easy, it was (as the Italians would say) like shooting on the red cross.

Let’s face it, the whole “Monti in Parliament Square” business is yet another spin-off of Taghnalkollist policy. There is no longer an attempt to hide the way the monster (or if you insist, like Musumeci, you can call it a “Movement”) thinks. The hawkers – like the hunters, the speculators, the utility bill payers – had been promised summat in the run up to last election. Meanwhile, the City Gate project and anything to do with the rehabilitation and improvement of Valletta was seen as a Nationalist party heritage – and therefore something that could be metaphorically defecated upon with the bene placquit of the Prime Minister. As a little tag along there is the other fact that anything that incenses the Maltese electorate is a valid enough distraction and smokescreen from the real shit that is afflicting the Bowel Movement.

Piano’s plans were never at the heart of this government. It will reluctantly inaugurate each part as it is finished but we had already seen how – thanks to the strategic positioning of the Taghnalkollist style kiosks the steps on each side of the gate had already been downgraded a notch. We had already been told that the planned garden in the moat had to be abandoned for “lack of funds” (only to find out that the First Lady of the Taghna Lkoll Movement had sidelined the same amount of money to refurbish gardens in some Palazzo to host high teas). The Monti move is only the Taghnalkollist cherry on the cake. It is wrong on a number of levels:

  1. It is an aesthetic blasphemy. It goes against everything that the Piano plans had for the entrance to Valletta. Where there is space let there be clutter.
  2. It is yet another corollary of Taghnalkollism. A cluster of hawkers in obnoxious stands cluttering the entrance to Valletta are to Taghna Lkoll as Futurism was to Fascism. In this case there is no manifesto of artistic endeavour that is being followed – simply the mantra of “Ok Siehbi” (anything goes) combined with a middle finger raised to the whole Piano plan.
  3. It also exalts a product that is anything but Maltese or traditional. Contrary to the belief of the few defenders of the plans to site the china-product peddlers in Parliament square, what is being sold is just as important a consideration. Fake football gears, bargain panties and iphone covers have no part to lay in a square that has been planned to be full of symbolism.
  4. Which brings me to the damn cross. Wizards of hermeneutic studies have already pointed out that the red cross has nothing to do with the Knights or Maltese history. Should that have been the only beef then it would have been passable. The problem is that the shoddy thinking behind the whole design is so transparently poor of any cultural content (and yes, I do say this with a high brow attitude) that it is enough to make grown men cry (apparently some did).

In all probability Muscat believes that he is cocking a snook to all things and ideas nationalist by allowing a monster market to flourish at the foot of the majestic project that has risen at Valletta’s entrance. What he is actually doing is paving the way for yet another of the many living monuments to mediocrity that have been blessed by this government and its party of lackey appointees.

The Bowel Movement now has its own artistic trademark to proudly show off. All you need is to misappropriate and misrepresent anything that is wrongly or rightly considered part of the national cultural heritage, slap it onto tacky structures and give it the PM’s blessing. He may claim to not like the design (in a highly predictable u-turn move designed to make him sound ever so decisive) but he will bless the befouling of a monumental masterpiece because that, my friends, is what Taghna Lkoll is all about.

Illum il-pjazza tagħna u nagħmlu li rridu.

See also: Muzikarti