Magistrate Rachel Montebello has ordered the prosecution of journalists for filing a story – for doing their job. They published a sordid picture: Joseph Cuschieri, former head of the Malta Gaming Authority and former CEO of the Malta Financial Services Authority, half-naked in an intimate embrace with bare-chested Yorgen Fenech, reclining on Fenech’s luxury yacht – both sticking their tongue out, taunting a nation.

Cuschieri, the regulator tasked with ensuring Fenech adhered to the rules, instead enjoyed the lavish hospitality of the accused. His intimacy with Fenech was starkly revealed in that jeering pose.

Fenech’s defence lawyers demanded action. Action is what they got from a servile judiciary. The magistrate ordered the prosecution of the authors of the Times story.

While our government diligently decriminalises vices destructive to our society, drug abuse and prostitution, our judiciary criminalises journalism. The magistrate protects the accused at the expense of our right to know.

The magistrate also invited the police commissioner to investigate leaks from Fenech’s phone. That means one thing – coercing journalists to reveal sources.

The decree casts a chilling effect. It achieves the same objectives as the SLAPP actions issued by Henley and Partners, with Joseph Muscat’s approval, against local media outlets. It prevents exposure of crime and corruption. And protects criminals.

In Malta, investigative journalists are the fingertips by which our democracy desperately clings on. They are the bulwark of the nation against organised crime and rampant corruption. Silencing journalists is the death blow to our democracy and a triumph for criminals and their political accomplices.

Labour’s web of crime and corruption – from Keith Schembri and Konrad Mizzi’s Panama companies, to Vitals, Electrogas, the Mozura windfarm, Pilatus, the db Group ITS deal, the St Vincent de Paul James Caterers’ extension – was exposed by journalists. One of them paid with her life.

If it weren’t for journalists, Muscat would still be prime minister, Mizzi deputy leader, Silvio Valletta deputy police commissioner, Chris Cardona minister, Schembri performing his deeds and Fenech still on his yacht canoodling with Cuschieri – and journalists would still be assassinated.

Instead of protecting journalists, the magistrate protects the alleged murder mastermind at the behest of his legal team. Not for the first time has our justice system persecuted journalists for their devotion to their duty to the public interest.

In 2017, police hauled journalists before the court in the dead of night. Then Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera, at the behest of Pilatus chairman Ali Sadr Hasheminejad, demanded journalists divulge the sources of leaked FIAU reports. Jacob Borg, from the Times, and Pierre Portelli, from the Independent, didn’t buckle under the magistrate’s pressure.

Had those stories not been published, Hasheminejad would still be in cahoots with Schembri, Adrian Hillman and Brian Tonna.

In Malta, investigative journalists are the fingertips by which our democracy desperately clings on- Kevin Cassar

Magistrate Scerri Herrera cited Article 46 of the Press Act: “The need for investigation by the court outweighs the need of the media to protect its sources.” In the magistrate’s learned opinion, protecting Pilatus bank trounced protecting the public from Pilatus’ crimes.

Journalists are rarely compelled to reveal their sources in democratic countries. They are prized guardians of the right to public information and defenders of democracy. Without the protection of sources, the journalists’ ability to expose corruption of public officials is obliterated.

In the landmark decision Goodwin vs UK, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that “an attempt to force a journalist to reveal sources violated Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights”.

Protection of journalistic sources is the essence of press freedom. The Council of Europe adopted a resolution in December 1994 stating that the protection of journalistic confidentiality maintains and promotes genuine democracy. The European Parliament added that it “increases transparency of decision-making and strengthens democratisation”.

An order to disclose sources has a chilling effect on press freedom. A decree to criminalise journalism is an outright assault on democracy.

When MaltaToday revealed the Enemalta oil scandal, former chairman Tancred Tabone was charged with corruption and bribery in February 2013. Eight years later, the case is still ongoing. The parliamentary Public Accounts Committee cannot even discuss an NAO report as the court ruled it would infringe Tabone’s rights.

While the journalists unearthed the crime, the courts prevent MPs from discussing the report, protect Tabone and deny the nation justice.

Our justice system protects criminals by procrastinating for years and interpreting laws in their favour. Crooks with unlimited means procure the services of high-profile lawyers to exploit every loophole and every prosecution flaw to launder their guilt.

While the crooks enjoy the luxury afforded by proceeds of crime, journalists are prosecuted and persecuted. The public suffers and democracy expires.

The EU justice scoreboard ranked Malta as the slowest justice system, and the longest cases involve money laundering. In Malta it takes 2,200 days for money laundering cases to be decided; in Luxembourg 100 days.

Malta is only one of three European states that fail to train judges on subjects such as judicial ethics and judgecraft. No wonder only two per cent of Maltese citizens resort to legal redress, compared to Denmark, where 38 per cent do. No surprise.

Why resort to an institution that protects criminals at the cost of the public interest?

Magistrate Montebello’s decree creates a hostile and intimidatory environment for journalists. It furthers the aims of an opaque, secretive government which subjects journalists to relentless abuse by ministers, the disdain of the prime minister and harassment by the executive.

Who benefits from silencing journalists? Robert Abela’s former clients, the Maksar brothers and their co-conspirators; Abela’s former party leaders, Muscat, Mizzi, Cardona; Abela’s cabinet ministers, Carmelo Abela, Ian Borg, Justyne Caruana, Evarist Bartolo and Rosianne Cutajar; and Abela himself, as he battles to conceal his tax returns, his direct orders, direct appointments and so much more.

No wonder he is so convinced the institutions are working – for his ex-clients, his friends and for himself. Certainly not for Malta.

Kevin Cassar is a professor of surgery and former PN candidate.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.