Readers have the ‘facts’ for Mintoff’s daughter

A Sunday Times interview with Dom Mintoff’s daughter sparked a strong reaction online where readers, including a Nationalist MP, gave their experiences of life under her father’s rule.

During the interview, Labour Party candidate Yana Mintoff Bland spoke enthusiastically about her political activism in the UK, where she spent much of her life.

But when asked why she never reacted to the human rights breaches in Malta during her father’s time, she said: “I would need more facts on that.”

Responding on timesofmalta .com, Nationalist MP Beppe Fenech Adami, son of President Emeritus Eddie Fenech Adami, recalled the 1979 attack on his family’s home in Birkirkara.

“I was a young 11-year-old when your father’s protected thugs attacked and ransacked our home. On that day, I, together with my brothers and 80-year-old grandmother, fled for our lives over the neighbouring rooftops... Your father’s protected thugs beat up my mother, who tried to enter our house to save us,” he wrote.

Environmentalist Astrid Vella also gave her account of the “systematic breach of human rights” by Mr Mintoff’s government.

“My father and his colleagues at the Public Works Department were systematically bullied and threatened, a victimisation that was so intense, vicious and unrelenting that it led to my father’s untimely death, while his colleagues suffered strokes and heart attacks,” she said.

And while University students were brutally attacked by her father’s supporters, Dr Mintoff Bland was “comfortably studying and fighting for human rights everywhere but on [her] father’s patch”, Ms Vella wrote.

“I am no Nationalist apologist... and I have no problem in stating that your father enacted many good measures, especially in the social field, but please don’t come claiming he was not a bully,” she added.

Reader Edward Caruana Galizia said Dr Mintoff Bland should simply search the term “Lorry Sant”, the former Works Minister, to find the necessary facts. “I would like to see this woman sit down with people who were badly treated by her father and listen to what they have to say,” he added.

Angelo Vassallo said Dr Mintoff Bland brought back vivid memories of 16 years of socialist rule where dissent was not tolerated and PN meetings were disrupted with showers of drainage.

Like many others, reader John Schembri recalled the burning of The Times’ building in 1979 and the attack on Dr Fenech Adami’s home by socialist thugs. He also mentioned the “blatant” requisition of private property to be handed over to Labour supporters and clubs.

George Cutajar brought up the suspension of the Constitutional Court and the prohibition of the words Malta and Nazzjon from non-government entities.

Other readers took Dr Mintoff Bland to task for entering the political fray before “concluding her research”.

Even former Labour general secretary Jimmy Magro objected to some of the comments made by Dr Mintoff Bland. “She felt sad when Alfred Sant called Mintoff a traitor. Did she feel sad when the Labour government was brought down by his vote? We worked so hard to be elected and were brought down in 22 months,” he lamented.

Dr Mintoff Bland could not be reached for comment yesterday but a few readers wrote in to defend her father or criticise his opponents.

Josef Borg recalled some of the major social changes implemented by Mr Mintoff’s government, including improved housing, pensions, children’s allowance, free education and healthcare and social services.

In turn, Victor Laiviera said the only Prime Minister in Maltese history found guilty in court of political discrimination was Dr Fenech Adami.