Theatre producer Mario Philip Azzopardi also testified at the public inquiry on Wednesday explaining how two satirical plays, Min qatel lil Daphne? and ix-Xiħa, had been intended to show how politics had totally taken over people’s lives. 

Both productions, shot down by the Manoel Theatre board, after being deemed inappropriate within the local scenario, had been produced by a local company run by Azzopardi, as part of a €20,000 deal funded by the Finance Ministry, to encourage Maltese-language plays.

Min qatel lil Daphne? produced but not written by Azzopardi, had been blocked by the theatre board after a reading of the title and a mere ten pages of script. 

In fact, at the time the play had been works in progress and the full script had never been completed. 

“The mistake was to reject the play without reading it,” said Azzopardi.

Nor had the production been publicised at all. “No, never, never!” he replied when asked by the board.

As for ix-Xiħa, Azzopardi recalled how he had been summoned for a very cordial meeting with Manoel Theatre’s artistic director, Kenneth Zammit Tabona, who, after having read through the script, had voiced some concern. 

One of the characters in the play was a wealthy blogger, a mother of four, whose character “was too close to that of Daphne Caruana Galizia,” Azzopardi had been told. 

Moreover, Zammit Tabona had also “taken offence” at the way Maltese aristocracy had been portrayed in the play, Azzopardi added.

Days after that meeting, he had been informed that the theatre board had rejected the play. 

Both productions had been inspired by similar satirical works abroad, explained Azzopardi, citing The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher, How I killed Margaret Thatcher as well as the international charts hit, Ding Dong the witch is dead. 

“Freedom of expression means that authors are free to write as they will, as long as it is not libelous,” the witness said, stressing that he condemned Daphne’s “heinous assassination” and believed that whoever was responsible was to get “what he deserved.”

But those plays were intended to send out a message against how all ordinary discussion had been totally taken over by politics, and how people were living under an oppressive cloud, robbed of serenity and friendship. 

Asked about his own relationship with Caruana Galizia, Azzopardi said that she had interviewed him once and had written about him.

“She lied about me,” admitting that the relationship had not been “good.”

But his plays had been a satirical expression.

“We are not at all against satire,” pointed out Chief Justice Emeritus Said Pullicino, explaining that the board was seeking to analyse the national atmosphere which could potentially have led to the journalist’s assassination.