Transport, Infrastructure and Capital Projects Minister Ian Borg has a serious credibility problem.

He has been involved in controversies ever since he was mayor of Dingli. Road-building agency Infrastructure Malta, which is part of his ministerial portfolio, has gained a reputation for going ahead with works before obtaining planning permission.

Questions on whether Borg is ‘fit for purpose’ abound on a popular level. Added to these people’s voices have been that of a magistrate and of the commissioner for standards in public life.

Borg ended 2020 with an indictment that should have immediately rendered him unfit for public office.

He unashamedly soldiered on, with the prime minister coming up with an excuse not to fire him.

The Magistrates’ Court found, at the end of November, that evidence Borg had given in a libel case lacked “credibility”. The case, which was not instituted by Borg, revolved around the purchase of a plot of land in Rabat from a man with mental health issues at a price below market value.

When he testified, Borg, who was parliamentary secretary at the time the sale took place, said he had known the seller for about 18 years and saw no reason to doubt his mental capacity, given he had signed about six other contracts prior to the one in question.

However, the magistrate remarked in his judgment that he found it difficult to believe how a resident of a small village like Dingli could claim not to be aware of the seller’s mental issues, which had even required the gentleman to be treated at Mount Carmel Hospital for some time.

When questioned about the matter in early December, Prime Minister Robert Abela said there were 20 days within which an appeal over the case could be filed so it was not prudent to comment at that point. The time-window laid down by law has long elapsed and no appeal appears to have been filed. 

Abela may naively decide to ignore both the sick man’s family and the magistrate’s conclusions and continue to defend Borg. On the other hand, he may have decided to give him more time and more rope to hang himself.

In fact, he has just been presented with another opportunity to consider whether his MP ranks should harbour a man whose conduct is glaringly unbecoming of a serious politician.

Less than two months after the minister’s credibility was questioned by a sitting magistrate, it was the turn of the standards commissioner to publicly declare, certainly by implication, that he did not believe Borg when the minister said he did not blaspheme during a TV chat show recently.

The minister insisted he had uttered words that only sounded as if he was swearing. However, after watching the clip, the standards commissioner thought otherwise.

In a report over a complaint he had received about the incident, the commissioner said he agreed with the complainant that a swear word had been uttered and did not agree with the minister’s explanation.

Still, he attributed it to a slip of the tongue, which did not justify a formal investigation in terms of law, since there had been no breach of ethics.

Had Borg simply apologised for his blip he might have regained some credibility. Be that as it may, what really matters here is that Borg has been caught giving cock and bull versions of events twice in under two months.

A person who plays so fast and loose with the truth cannot be trusted with public office.

Abela’s failure to take action against a minister who thinks they are above the law would be blasphemous in terms of good governance.