The government's attempts to institute legal reform should be based on justice and not impunity, the Daphne Foundation said on Thursday, in criticism of the freshly announced bill to reform magisterial inquiries.
On Tuesday Justice Minister Jonathan Attard tabled a bill to amend the criminal code and reform the way people can request a magisterial inquiry.
Private individuals have a right to ask the courts to investigate alleged crimes without involving the police by appealing directly to a magistrate.
However, after lawyer and former PN MP Jason Azzopardi requested several inquiries of this nature, Prime Minister Robert Abela ordered to minister to reform the system to curb what he called “abuse”.
Separately, Abela has also pledged to protect civil servants and government entity workers from being taken to court in a personal capacity.
The specific contents of the bill remain unknown at present.
In a statement, the Daphne Foundation said that shielding public officers from being held responsible for their actions in office would effectively reward crime committed in office by those whose duty it is to prevent it.
"Since 1854, the Criminal Code has provided for a penalty of a higher degree when a crime is committed by a public servant because of the public servants’ role as the guardian of the public interest," they said.
Claims by the prime minister that magisterial inquiries are leading to people having to face the "calvary" of court proceedings only to be found innocent is manifestly false, the group continued, as inquiries over the past decade have all independently concluded with recommendations for criminal action.
"As the law stands today, it implicitly allows a citizen to file a criminal complaint in court that can lead to a magisterial inquiry to preserve evidence of crime," they said.
"Removing citizens’ right to request a magisterial inquiry - as the Government has implied its new proposed law will do - would eliminate the only tool that allows us to pursue accountability when State systems fail to do so."
The Foundation said that Malta's raft of prosecutions of high-level corruption, including the Vitals/Steward hospitals deal and the shortly expected 17 Black case, all stem from magisterial inquiries that were triggered after an individual filed a criminal complaint in court.
"Legal reforms are necessary because the current systems are inefficient, but reform must serve justice and enforce accountability for the abuse of power, and not shore up the state of impunity that enabled Daphne Caruana Galizia’s assassination."