Keith Schembri did not steal a barn owl. Had he done so, he would have been denied bail. That’s if the fate of tree groomer Ronald Azzopardi, who did help himself to a barn owl at Buskett last week, is anything to go by.

Still, there is something distinctly owlish about the Schembri case. For some reason, law and order in Malta appear to be nocturnal species, especially when certain people who are not tree groomers are involved.

Exactly why he was arrested in the small hours is a mystery to me. Perhaps the police figured there was something of the night about him, and that direct sunlight would compromise their strike.

Or maybe it’s the stars-hide-your-fires argument and that the case is so embarrassing that the less we see of it, the better.

The reason why it is so is that Schembri was, and is, as close as it gets to you-know-who. Readers might not wish to take my word for it.

No matter, because they could always read what Chris Fearne told the Daphne inquiry two weeks ago. So close was Muscat to his chief of staff, he flatly refused to discuss him with the deputy prime minister or any other member of cabinet.

When Fearne questioned Muscat’s judgement at the time of the Panama Papers scandal, Muscat’s reply was “he is my person of trust and it’s up to me to decide, not Cabinet”. That’s in Fearne’s exact words, said under oath.

Muscat trusted Schembri absolutely. He made sure Schembri was accountable to him alone. He stood by and protected him until the end.

Which means that even the most credulous, and the sceptical, and Robert Musumeci, must now find themselves asking some deeply unsettling questions about Muscat.

It so happens the range of answers is limited.

The first possibility is that Muscat and Schembri were equal partners in the marriage. That is, whatever Schembri was up to – and the more we hear, the grimmer it gets – Muscat was equally up to. My feeling is that this is the likeliest possibility.

The second is that Schembri systematically and spectacularly betrayed Muscat’s trust: Muscat had not the slightest scent of what his chief of staff was up to and acted in good faith throughout.

Joseph Muscat, you see, has developed what we might call a herd impunity- Mark Anthony Falzon

I don’t see why we should believe this. For years, we were told how clever and shrewd Muscat was, and how unfailing his nose.

It turns out he was a naïve and gullible chump all along, especially where it mattered most. Right-o.

The third option is that Muscat knew about all or some of what was going on, but chose to look the other way – and did so for years, knowingly risking his own skin in the process. Which raises the obvious question. Maybe Schembri had something on him. Or the string of rebħiet storiċi made him reason that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. With cynics, the gutter’s the limit.

Whichever of the three it is, last week’s events leave Muscat very far up that creek with not a paddle in sight. Or they should do so.

Except I’m not so sure, because there’s still a space reserved for the man’s bum in our highest institution. Tens of thousands of people still hero-worship him and his legacy.

The prime minister’s wife was on telly the other day going on about all the ġid he did. The social media is dark with photos of people in various kinds of clinches with him. His portrait will hang at Castille. And so on.

Muscat, you see, has developed what we might call a herd impunity, in at least two ways. Certainly he was, and probably still is, protected by the inner herd – many of whom have tested positive countless times. The myth of Joseph’s ġid is central to their survival.

For the chosen few, it’s what stands between them and a day at the beach with Lt Col Alexander Dalli (Ret’d).

There’s a greater herd, too (and I use the word without the usual odious connotations). It’s made up of Labourites who believe that Muscat was the innocent victim of some sort of conspiracy, that he sacrificed himself for the good of the country and that we’re all the poorer for it, Robert or no Abela. It’s the kind of canard Karl Stagno Navarra seems to specialise in: I’m actually amazed he hasn’t said the words ‘George’ and ‘Soros’ yet.

The outcome is that the Muscats are, for the time being at least, as safe as a selfie. And yet, where do you go to my lovely. Maybe, just maybe, the nocturnal habits of the law will have murdered sleep.

mafalzon@hotmail.com

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.