My heart goes out sincerely to Desmond Zammit Marmarà as his angst and sorrow was displayed in his recent article (‘Abela’s colossal blunders’, February 4).
He is a genuine Labourite who has loved his party and worked for it all his life. It is not for me to judge him why the colossal blunders he wrote about have become the straw that proverbially broke the camel’s back.
Robert Abela wants to appear as the father who is prepared to welcome back his prodigal children. It is good to remember that the prodigal son in the famous parable misspent his own money. Labour prodigals used the people’s money to enrich themselves by pigging out. Their words not mine.
How can we expect Abela to act any differently; he is soft on drugs, he has no ethical compass, he ignores natural justice, he discriminates about the application of justice, and he purposely sought out to bring into the party people with a shady past.
During the last election campaign, he connived to make a show at the village of Għasri by welcoming into his fold the erstwhile Nationalist (?) leader of the local council, Daniel Attard.
Now if he had spoken to the Labour councillors for advice, he would have been told that they were unhappy about a mayor who spent more days abroad than he spent in Għasri (and he still does); a mayor who never represented his locality on the Gozo Regional Council (and other bodies) or even attended occasions when all mayors in Gozo gather to celebrate Gozo Day.
Then, to add insult to injury, the mayor presented himself as an independent to his council, having spoken at a public rally organised by the Labour Party in Ta’ Sannat.
What am I saying? Abela’s calculations have always been political in nature. Power and its retention always come first for him, irrespective of consequences.
What were the effects of Attard’s sudden conversion to Labour? Even less presence in the village, with projects half-finished as there is no leadership; the resignation of an excellent executive secretary and, later, of another locum secretary, and a crisis in the council, which only did not collapse because the four councillors, both Labour and Nationalist, were determined to not let that happen and helped a clerk in her daily tasks to keep the show going.
Desmond Zammit Marmarà is a genuine Labourite who has loved his party and worked for it all his life
If Zammit Marmarà wants to know of colossal blunders by a mayor protected by Abela, here’s another, also from Għasri. One fine morning two government ministers arrived in Għasri unannounced for a photo opportunity when an electric van was to be presented to the mayor. But there was no van and no mayor. Panic set in and the executive secretary called all councillors to give a welcome to the ministers. And we did and arranged for them to have a cup of coffee at the parish centre.
This is how Abela works. He brings into Labour incompetent, unscrupulous and non-committed individuals who are there for their own aggrandizement and not for the people.
But Zammit Marmarà should delve deeper into his conscience.
The whole saga which is enfolding in front of our eyes at the courts exposes families being destroyed because they swallowed the bait from a corrupt scheme run from Castille to fraudulently acquire disability benefits for life.
It is right that they are being sentenced and they are giving back what they have stolen. Some of them have bought properties, others have got used to a standard of living unknown to them previously for a myriad of reasons and now? They must see how they are going to manage their lives.
However, it was revealed in court that middlemen were involved who have taken for themselves a good chunk of the ill-gotten loot. Yet, no middlemen have appeared in court.
Why? Were they close to ministers and high-ranking Labourites? Where is justice?
If Zammit Marmarà, rightly so, feels unable to vote Labour for the colossal blunders involving the welcome-back rogues, should he not go deeper, as should every Labour voter, and think seriously about the damage Abela is doing to the country by allowing corruption to flourish?
The fact that the benefits racket was discovered, and action was taken, does not exculpate him, after all why did it take him two years to act?
Only blind justice applied to all miscreants will close this chapter totally.
But Abela is incapable of redeeming Labour as he himself is the protector of all that is corrupt in the Labour Party.
Salvu Felice PaceSalvu Felice Pace is a local councillor in Għasri.