The police corps under commissioner Angelo Gafà has changed its cars and its uniforms but has not improved since the days of commissioner Lawrence Cutajar, rule of law group Repubblika charged on Tuesday.
“Despite promising to deliver justice to all, Gafà still allows the police corps to protect a class of important individuals and 'friends of friends'. It is truly a case of the wolf changing only his clothing but not his actions,” the NGO's president, Robert Aquilina, told a press conference outside police headquarters.
He listed examples of the police failing to take action, saying that they have enough evidence to charge four individuals with obstruction of justice related to the Daphne Caruana Galizia murder investigation.
The group has previously named former police commissioner Lawrence Cutajar as one of those individuals.
On Tuesday, Aquilina said that enough evidence existed that implicated former chief of staff Schembri and Yorgen Fenech (who is awaiting trial for complicity in the murder of Caruana Galizia) as well as former assistant police commissioner Silvio Valletta.
Aquilina said Gafà is sitting on evidence that Schembri texted a copy of the presidential pardon offered to Melvin Theuma to accused murder mastermind Yorgen Fenech before it was issued.
Aquilina also mentioned how Vince Muscat, who was convicted for his role in the Caruana Galizia murder, had testified more than once under oath that former minister Chris Cardona had attempted to set in motion a plot to murder the journalist earlier, and the police corps have not proceeded with court action about this assassination attempt.
Similarly, he added, the police have been complacent on a report by the auditor general that several government directors had paid themselves unauthorised bonuses and had yet to return the funds.
“To Angelo Gafà I say: do you not realize that you are not only ridiculing yourself but also the entire police corps and the whole country?” Aquilina asked.
“Our country deserves a police force that does its duty with integrity and is not afraid to hold up the mirror of justice to those in power.”