The reopening of further shuttered businesses is on the horizon, Prime minister Robert Abela said on Sunday, as the coronavirus pandemic appears to have been largely contained. 

Speaking during an interview on the Labour Party’s media platforms, Abela said that in the coming weeks the government would begin rolling out measures to stimulate the economy.  

At the start of May, Abela had announced the reopening of a first batch of non-essential businesses that had been ordered to shut their doors to stop the pandemic spreading.

On Sunday, he said it would not be long before further announcements were made.  Each industry had its own realities, he said, and these needed to be taken into account. 

Abela said health protocols were being drafted by the authorities, and he augured that these would not to be so stringent that they made life impossible. 

Abela said he had been consulting with stakeholders in impacted industries, such as bars and restaurants, and entertainment venues, and taking their suggestions on board as the government and its advisors map out the "new normal”. 

He said that while the government wanted to learn lessons from the way life has been over the last seven weeks, the public could not continue living in fear of each other.  

I hope this new normal isn’t too new. We can’t go back to exactly the way things were before the virus, but I also don’t want people to live in fear,- Prime Minister

“I hope this new normal isn’t too new. We can’t go back to exactly the way things were before the virus, but I also don’t want people to live in fear,” he said.  

Looking back over the pandemic, Abela said there had been many who had called on him to implement a total lockdown, and while he had listened to this advice, he had also heard from other experts, and in the end his decision not to go for a lockdown had been the right one.   

"One day we will look back at 2020, and the historic achievement as the world passed through a pandemic. And we will say that Malta and the Maltese showed that they were greater than the fear and the challenges of this virus,” he said.  

Abela said he is receiving daily insight from the public,  which he said, helped him understand the changing realities. For instance, it was pointless telling single parents to go back to work, if childcare centres remain closed.  

Migration relocation system 

Abela said Malta was lobbying the EU to introduce an automatic migrant relocation system.   

Malta has closed its ports to migrants and has leased out two tourist pleasure boats to act as offshore detention centres for those rescued at sea.  

Abela on Sunday said that Malta wanted a system which would see member states automatically agree to take in a share of rescued migrants.  

On Friday Malta pulled out of an EU-funded naval mission in the Mediterranean, and used its veto to block its funding. 

Abela said that while this was a tough stance, it was necessary to send a message to Brussels and other members states, that the migration situation could not be ignored. 

While the numbers of migrants landing in Malta may not seem that high to the island's EU partners, when seen in the context of Malta's small size, it was quite considerable. The number of migrants that have landed in Malta this year would be equivalent to some 700,000 arriving in Germany, he said.  

Abela said Malta needed the help of Opposition, and civil society, and said he wanted to collaborate with them to find solutions.  

“This is a national challenge and so we have to address it as one nation together,” he said.