Recent events at the law courts have sent a shaft of light and hope throughout Malta and a shaft of darkness and fear in the direction of the clique around our former disgraced prime minister, Joseph Muscat and his cronies.
Maltese judges throughout Malta’s recent history of the last century and a half have always proven to be stalwart citizens with brilliant minds and fearless application of the law. Justice is always portrayed as being blind. And so it should be.
Our judges, the likes of Sir Adrian Dingli, J.J. Cremona, Hugh Harding, Joseph Said Pullicino and others before and after independence, proved themselves to be as sharp and honest as any judge in any other country in the world. What about courage? Who does not remember judge Maurice Caruana Curran under the terrible Mintoff years? Not only did he do his duty with integrity and clear mindedness but also stood up to the unruly mob that attacked his car and nearly took his life.
In between those terrible times until the Mintoffian rabble was thrown out by the electorate, we have had excellent judges in Valletta as well as at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg and at the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg.
Now, once again, the strong backbone of our corps of judges is being put to the test. After a barrage of injustices, scandals, theft of national assets, bribes and secret bank accounts as well as an infiltration and destabilisation of many institutions we could expect a breakdown of our judicial system.
But no. First the public inquiry into the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia led by two retired and one active member of our judiciary published its damning report and, in these last few weeks, several eminent judges upheld the long tradition of our judiciary with breakthrough judgments. One example is the constitutional court, which removed a magistrate who would not recuse herself and reprimanded her that, in case of doubt, the benefit should always fall in favour of those doubting the independence of the person who is to make the judgment.
The Enemalta case, decided in favour of the two citizens who felt cheated by Enemalta that failed to abide by the law and misused the billing system in favour of Enemalta and against the rights of the customers by failing to carry out regular 12-monthly corrections, is another. Other cases are sub judice such as the case over the sale of the hospitals to Vitals and the challenges to the authorities to institute cases into the criminal activity around the sale of the electricity manufacturer to Electrogas.
There are challenges to the attorney general who many allege is breaking her oath of independence and her training as a lawyer when she fails to obey a court order to pursue criminals in the Pilatus case or when she initiates an appeal against the constitutional court decision in the recusal of the magistrate.
However, we are also being governed by other courts situated outside our borders.
It is only when we take to the courts that the facts see the light of day- John Vassallo
The European Court of Justice has two major issues before it.
One is about the sale of European passports by Malta to persons who not only have no connection to Malta, even when local lawyers, including our prime minister himself, who should lead by example, enter into leases of property to such foreigners who need to pretend to reside here when they do not. A member state cannot place the security of other member states at risk by selling the right to EU citizenship to people who have suspiciously earned wealth.
The second issue is bird indiscriminate hunting and trapping and the failed application of the protection of endangered or protected species by our own police.
The European Court of Human Rights has also, on many occasions, sanctioned Malta.
Yes, we are, luckily, in these last months in the hands of judges at home and abroad and therein lies our greatest hope.
Our hope of bringing back the rule of law to Malta will not happen only because a few thousand people, including myself, take to the streets at regular intervals.
It is not because Daphne was murdered or because threats are regularly made to activists who lead the street protests or initiate the cases in the courts when the police commissioner or the attorney general fail to do their duty because of alleged pressure from Castille.
These institutions failed to prosecute persons after the Panama Papers, the medical visas racket, the sale of hospitals to Vitals, the Electrogas scandal and the state aid to Enemalta, which has over the last 10 years robbed Maltese households over their electricity to the tune of several hundred million euros and by not applying the law by making 12 monthly corrections to their monthly or quarterly bulling system.
The list can go on and is endless. By taking to the streets, we show discontent but, apparently, it is only when we take to the courts that the facts see the light of day and the population in general will wake up to the truth.
The truth will always prevail in the end, as we all know, but the wheels of justice grind very slowly and, because of spokes placed in those wheels, it will take time.
But it is not for those of us who are pensioners, and only have a few years of life left, but for our children and grandchildren that we believe that things will change and we have great hope in the independent and courageous judges in Malta and abroad.
John Vassallo is a former ambassador to the EU.