President emeritus Marie Louise Coleiro Preca on Sunday appealed to her party to apologise to the country and the party's supporters and asked it to carry out a "soul-searching" exercise.

Writing in Malta Today, the former President says the Labour Party owes the country and its supporters an apology. The party must apologise to all who “genuinely believed in its moral credentials and supported it, and to all the people of these islands,” she writes.

Coleiro Preca refers to recent allegations linking the PL to secret offshore companies and said the party had to establish what it stands for, and see whether it is simply “power-hungry” and “merely directed by surveys" rather than by "political, social and moral values”. 

Praising the current government for strengthening the countries institutions through “significant changes”, Coleiro Preca says it has to ensure the government has to ensure are guided by  “good governance, transparency, accountability and effective checks and balances”. 

She warns against the demonisation of civil society and calls for the strengthening of the media for its “essential role for a functioning democracy”. 

She calls on the country to reflect on why people are losing trust in institutions, leaders and political parties and says the PL has to ensure it is still faithful to its founding principles to support workers, the poor and the vulnerable and not “simply mesmerised” by any business that comes along.