'Civil society should apply for Daphne monument': Alex Agius Saliba

PL MEP and Labour Party deputy leader Alex Agius Saliba said on Saturday that members of civil society who commemorated the memory of Daphne Caruana Galizia should apply for a proper memorial for the murdered journalist. 

Speaking on Andrew Azzopardi’s radio programme on Saturday morning, Agius Saliba was discussing the removal of tributes to Caruana Galizia from the Great Siege Monument earlier this month, hours after the eighth anniversary of her murder. 

Government employee Neville Gafà was filmed removing flowers, wreaths, candles and placards in the middle of the night. While embassies criticised the move, the office of the prime minister said he was acting in his ‘personal capacity’.

Prime Minister Robert Abela has confirmed that there are no discussions to build a monument in honour of the slain journalist.

Agius Saliba was speaking hours before Gafà resigned as a person of trust within the Office of the Prime Minister, saying his resignation was linked to an article on his blog titled 'Kids don’t need new genders. They need parents with common sense'. 

Agius Saliba said that while he did not want to defend Gafà, the discussion should be about respecting the national Great Siege monument.

“Have you ever heard of a national monument being used for eight years as a memorial?” he asked. “It’s unheard of.”

He said civil society had the right to protest and place as many candles and flowers as it wished, but the use of the national monument should be “regulated”.

He described the behaviour of both those who remove the flowers and those who use it as a memorial site as “toxic”.

“I would never remove any flowers or candles from a memorial site, but let us show some respect for this national monument,” he said, describing the site as being “vandalised” with flowers and candles. 

“Repubblika, Occupy Justice and the Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation should, as NGOs, apply for a monument for Daphne - they would not be stopped. That way, Daphne’s memory and life can be celebrated.”

He highlighted how the make-shift memorial in Bidnija, at the site of her death, has never been removed. 

“This is because it is not a site that has a national monument,” he explained. 

He said if the public wanted to pay respect to Caruana Galizia’s memorial, it should not be done by throwing "spectacles (xenati) of placing flowers and then having them removed".

“We should not let these things become politicised, as it will do no good to her memory.”