Olympic athletes’ conundrum

I find this bit of news about the Olympics rather distressing. Having been a sporting woman all my life, I find it incredible that the World Olympic Committee has decided to disregard fair competition which is the soul of the Olympics.

I am enclosing the text so that readers will see for themselves what is going on.

“The Tokyo Olympics begin on July 23 and, thanks to a rule change, male-born athletes are now allowed to compete alongside women in female categories.

“Disturbingly, the selection of Laurel Hubbard, a biological male, for the New Zealand women’s weightlifting team has robbed a 21-year-old woman from Tonga of the life-changing opportunity to compete in her first Olympics and demoralised the entire female weightlifting community who are asking: what is the point in competing?

“According to a study by World Rugby, there is a 30 per cent difference between the weightlifting ability of women and men.

“It’s no wonder that Anna Vanbellighan, a leading female weightlifter due to compete in the Olympics against Hubbard, has described the situation as ‘a bad joke’.”

It is food for thought.

Margaret Parnis England – Kappara

Gozo’s roads to nowhere

Photo: Clifton Fenech/DOI

Last November – I repeat, last November – amid so much fanfare that my neighbours were saying that a general election must be imminent, the prime minister “opened” a major road in Gozo that was being… er... resurfaced (photo, right).

After his motorcade left the scene, the workmen left too.

And the main road into Għajnsielem village (including to the Grand Hotel) and to Qala and, at least in theory, to Nadur, remains unfinished. Little attention has been paid to it since the prime minister’s visit, although somebody has kindly placed bollards beside the iron manhole covers that protrude by about six inches.

Meanwhile, the road with which this stretch (Sant’Antnin) connects to Nadur (and connects Nadur to the harbour) remains in the state it has been in for about four years. That is, it is closed to traffic, dug up and unattended by workmen.

Normally, I wouldn’t mention this – it is pretty typical for Gozo – but now I read about plans for a new wide road to connect Victoria to Marsalforn, where a perfectly adequate road already exists (or would, if the potholes were filled). The theory is that it will allow for more cars, without any thought about what happens to them when they get to the end of the journey. A far better idea might be to create more parking space in Marsalforn.

I am old enough to remember when a start was made on the much-needed Victoria ring-road. Look carefully and you can still see the beginning of it – it progressed for something like 25 metres before the developers called it a day. I remember the new road to Xlendi ‒ it melted on the first hot day of summer, with tarmac flowing down the hill in waves. And the road to Għarb – announced as the first road going to be built within time and within budget – which went over time and over budget within about six weeks of being started.

The one success was the main highway into Qala, built without any thought of drainage but otherwise excellent... until it was dug up at the Xewkija end and resurfaced at a different level from the rest of the road.

So Gozo does not have much of a reputation for road-building capability (and even less of completion). Perhaps, one day,  it will occur to the minister that there are no votes in starting things he patently is incapable of getting finished.

Revel Barker – Għajnsielem

Tax evasion warning

We have been “warned” that tax evasion cases are being given priority. It seems that the government is, as usual, trying to impress, in the hope that, some time soon, the greylisting will revert to white. So, by its admission, tax evasion was never a priority to the government.

We were also given a statistic of what happened in 2019, 2020 and 2021. I sincerely hope that FATF is impressed!

It would have been better if the deputy police commissioner had told us that they intended going after the big fish in the noble quest of prosecuting tax evaders. From the report in Times of Malta, one can arrive at the conclusion that the police have been roped in on an exercise to mitigate matters in so far as FATF is concerned.

Mario Dingli – Sliema

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