Malta is being battered by two pandemics at the moment: that of the coronavirus and that of overdevelopment.

In the first case, doctors and nurses are doing their heroic utmost to try and control it. In the second, people who should be administering the cure to control it are politicians and the Planning Authority, who seem to think nothing of going against the moral ethics of their profession. They actively encourage the transmission of overdevelopment rather than curbing it.

I can just imagine the despair felt by Din l-Art Ħelwa president, Alex Torpiano, as he compiled list upon list of examples of the ugly development in Malta and Gozo. “It feels as if people have gone mad,” he told Times of Malta earlier last week. It’s one horror story after another: “higher, bigger and grosser” buildings, quashing whatever heritage they stand next to.

Loopholes are exploited like there’s no tomorrow: multi-storey buildings are raised in narrow streets in urban centres and village cores. Traditional two-storey houses in towns are knocked down to make way for narrow high-rise flats, each looking like an overgrown, upside-down tooth, until all the houses in the street start falling down to make way for more overgrown concrete teeth.

We can point our fingers at developers till we’re blue in the face but the truth is that, although they may be conniving, ultimately it is not they who are making the final decisions.

Sadly, the Planning Authority has been turned into yet another electoral machine pandering to the government’s canvassing for votes. “It has forgotten its remit to protect urban and natural heritage assets,” Torpiano said. The brief seems to be one: to hell with aesthetics, to hell with neighbourly consideration and to hell with heritage, just give everyone what they want in return for votes.

There is also another reason: corruption. Some people must be lining their pockets through mafia deals struck at the time of Joseph Muscat. In order to ward off discontent from the rest of us – because they’re bathing in champagne while we can barely keep up with the cost of living – they’ve made our economy dependant on the construction industry. Which means that, now, if we want to make an extra bit of money we have no option but to sell our homes and turn them into ugly high-rises. Sadly, we’re being made to uglify our very own terroir, for the benefit of the mafia.

“Ugliness, in a way, is superior to beauty because it lasts” – Serge Gainsbourg, French singer.

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The uglification around us is nothing but a visible reflection of what is going on in the soul of the people leading this country. People in top positions of authority, elected or appointed by us and paid from our taxes to safeguard us and our environment, are doing none of the sort. Instead, week in, week out, the evidence that comes out from court reveals some would rather hang out with criminals and plot to shield their mafia network.

Such is the warped way of life in Malta at the moment: chasing the people seeking the truth instead of criminals and masterminds- Kristina Chetcuti

To me, this means one thing: that criminals and psychopaths are happily milling around us instead of being locked up. An arrangement was made with one of the hitmen in the Daphne Caruana Galizia assassination, the self-confessed killer Vince Muscat il-Koħħu, to reveal details on the case. One presumes the police recommended this because they had reasons to believe his testimony was credible enough.

Indeed, I can’t get il-Koħħu’s chilling testimony out of my mind. For him and the other two hitmen, stalking, plotting, and killing Daphne was nothing but “a job”.

In his court testimony, il-Koħħu mentioned key people specifically: Joseph Muscat’s deputy leader, Chris Cardona; Muscat’s chief of staff, Keith Schembri; their buddy David Gatt (“village lawyer” my foot); and Muscat’s deputy police commissioner, Silvio Valletta.

The police have, so far, not called anyone in for questioning. If this is not ‘believable evidence’, then why on earth strike a deal with this hitman?

Just flip the coin for a minute will you – imagine if, instead, he had mentioned the names of, say, people in the NGO Repubblika or Occupy Justice or the names of journalists and bloggers who are exposing this rot. They would all have had policemen behind the door before il-Koħħu’s spit would have even dried out. Such is the warped way of life in Malta at the moment: chasing the people seeking the truth instead of criminals and masterminds.

Really and truly, with the institutions being so lax, the masterminds and all those involved in this Malta mafia have all the time in the world to run away from the island. They have enough money amassed to be able to buy themselves a vast Bahamas beach where they can spend the rest of the days sipping Bloody Marys and ignoring the blood on their hands. But, instead, they stay here. And there can only be one reason for that: they must be extremely confident that the process of justice can be thwarted and they won’t end up behind bars.

I wouldn’t be so cocky if I were them. From il-Koħħu’s evidence, it’s clear that all those involved in the assassination were taken aback by the civil unrest and protests. They weren’t used to that sort of reaction after a bombing ‘job’, he claimed.

So, really, all it takes is for each and every one of us to voice our protest – and to show that we won’t stand by and allow the process of justice to be thwarted.

They are the ones who have to live in the pits of ugliness they dug out for themselves – they can’t pull us under with them.

“Ugly is a word that should only be used to describe sin” – Ritu Ghatourey, Indian author.

krischetcuti@gmail.com
twitter: @krischetcuti