Malta is at a crossroads. This is how Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca described this critical moment in the country’s history following the publication of the inquiry report on the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. The board of inquiring judges found the State under Joseph Muscat responsible for the climate of impunity that allowed the murder to be committed.
“We either take the right road to reform our institutions to ensure we live in a true democracy, or else get lost in political rhetoric and risk a repeat of more shameful episodes in future,” the former president warned last week.
At this point in time, the only person in Malta who has the power to decide which road to take is Prime Minister Robert Abela.
As he stands at the crossroads, one fork in the road leads to a fabric of national institutions independent and robust enough to take effective action against the first sign of wrongdoing by anyone in power.
This would ensure impunity never has another chance to spread “like an octopus”, as the three judges put it so well. It would embed in our system the checks on abuse of power that are the mark of true democracy, in which the people and the common good, not politicians or private interests, are the ones being served.
The other fork in the road gets lost in a forest of “political rhetoric”. One of the aims of political rhetoric – boasts about achievement, pledges to discuss, promises of change – is to avoid meaningful action and preserve the status quo.
Abela and the Labour Party are well ahead in the polls; why should he do anything differently? That road, though, would become a never-ending maze of false starts and dead ends, locking the political parties into eternal, time-wasting discord. This is not the decisive action the country needs right now.
To avoid this scenario, Times of Malta has proposed that an independent commission be set up of non-partisan experts of proven integrity who can take the board’s recommendations on strengthening journalism and the rule of law further. It would make concrete proposals for legislation, government policies and administrative practices within a binding agreement by the political parties to act on those proposals.
The board of inquiry has acknowledged the work done by the Abela administration to strengthen the institutions. Recent police action on the murder itself is testament to that.
But the board said more improvement is required. A commission such as that suggested here, reporting to parliament within a given time frame, would get the job done quicker than leaving it up to bickering parties who hardly ever see eye to eye. Malta has no time to waste in restoring its shredded international reputation.
The choice facing Abela can be framed in other ways.
What future will he create for the country? One where impunity still rules or one where the law reigns supreme?
Will it be truth or denial? True reform or a pretence of one? Will he choose this historic opportunity to effect real change or squander it for ‘continuity’ and ‘business as usual’? Will he be the statesman the country needs or stoop to pettiness and posturing?
Will he be brave enough, as a first essential step to reform, to submit his government and party to political accountability and purge them of the untouchables that cling on? Will he make an attempt to stop the blatant nepotism and power of incumbency that continues to weigh down the country? Or will he shrink in fear at the potential damage this will do to him politically?
Will he choose business interests or those of the ordinary taxpayer?
What future will he create for the country? One where impunity still rules or one where the law reigns supreme?
The choice is Abela’s.