St Thomas of Aquinas, in the second part of his Summa Theologiae, argued that both hangmen and prostitutes, although undesirable, are necessary in society. I am not going to defend capital punishment or prostitution, both of which I find abhorring. However, St Aquinas’s proposition that even the things we consider most heinous can be necessary is well worth considering, especially within the concept of good governance.

I thought of this recently when a government minister felt it opportune to ask the police to investigate a priest for a homophobic rant. Of late, the prime minister and his ministers on several occasions have repeatedly claimed that it is not their role to ask the police to investigate or push for investigations against individuals. This, they argued, would constitute political interference in police work.

Despite this stance, in this particular case, the minister felt that the benefits of making the call outweighed the negatives of potentially interfering with police work. The minister felt that making the call to the commissioner of police was a necessary evil. The minister had a choice none of which were strictly kosher and went for what she felt was the lesser evil of the two.

I am not going to stand here today and argue against the minister’s call. However, one has to comment on the hypocrisy given that the prime minister and ministers have repeatedly failed to encourage the police to seriously investigate Konrad Mizzi and Joseph Muscat. The American government and its investigative agencies recently declared Mizzi a persona non-grata in the United States. Yet, in Malta, the same Mizzi still serves in the highest institution of the country.

Our country is blacklisted because of the sordid filth these two dragged us through.  And when, finally, a courageous, young inquiring magistrate orders the police to investigate Muscat as part of its inquiry into the scandalous Vitals hospital deal entered into by Muscat and Mizzi, we get the prime minister questioning the inquiring magisterial order to confiscate the Muscat family phones and warning the “institutions”, of which the inquiring magistrate forms part, to safeguard the trust placed in them, as if by exercising their duties and finally investigating Muscat the “institutions” were betraying such trust.

Perhaps the prime minister was referring to the trust of Jason Micallef who quickly took to Facebook to call upon the masses to take to the streets and demonstrate against the inquiring magistrate’s exercise of her duties. 

These last few days we were reminded of Mizzi when news emerged of Air Malta’s bankruptcy. Three years ago, Mizzi had reassured the country that Air Malta was profitable again. He was, of course, lying. The airline was losing money, big money on a daily basis. And, yet, the airline, we have now discovered, went on to order from Airbus long-haul planes to fly to New York and India and satisfy Mizzi’s fantasy, which order has had to be now renegotiated to three short-haul planes, of which the airline is now also trying to negotiate the sale and lease back.

Roberta Metsola’s election is the only good news our country has had internationally in the last few years- Mario de Marco

One has to ask what was the cost of all this madness, how was a bankrupt airline going to fund the purchase of these long-haul planes, what was the cost of the renegotiation, does Air Malta even need the three short-haul planes it renegotiated the long-haul plane order into and what is the loss Air Malta will bear if it is not successful in the resale of the new aircraft. One has to also ask how many people were employed by the national airline at the request of Mizzi’s ministry during his tenure as minister responsible for Air Malta?

Corruption has many guises and dishing out public sector jobs as a political favour is one of them. The director of events of the Malta Tourism Authority, a man who, in the past, was convicted of fraud, was a former canvasser of Mizzi. The qualifications and experience requisites to become a director for the tourism authority must have been significantly altered from the time I was tourism minister. There is no way his application would have been considered for such a sensitive job.

But, under this Labour government, the principles of good governance, principles such as meritocracy, transparency and accountability, no longer apply. When it came to choosing between ‘progress’ and good governance, the Labour government chose the former.

The eradication of good governance was considered a necessary evil. Under the mantra of being a business-friendly government, they removed good governance to bolster the bottom line.

For seven years, the national GDP and government books flourished while good governance floundered. Now, we are seeing GDP and government finances struggle.

Many businesses are also under serious strain.

Some might argue that this is due to COVID-19. The truth, however, is that COVID-19 only served to accelerate a process that had already started before the advent of this medical emergency. Government coffers were already drying up, not least because of the drop in revenues from the much-maligned IIP scheme coupled with the unrestrained no-questions-asked government excessive expenditure. Public debt has now shot up from €5 billion in 2019 to €8 billion in 2021.

As a country, we sold our soul to the devil and, as a result, our reputation is the lowest it has ever been.

I was deeply saddened to see that expats rate us as the least attractive country to live in. So much for becoming the best in the world.

Roberta Metsola’s landslide election to the post of president of the European parliament is the only good news that our country has had internationally in the last few years.

I have one message to those who think that Labour can get us out of this mess. The only thing Labour can do is dig a deeper hole.

It is time for a change and, whatever faults the Nationalist Party carries, it is the only party that can reverse the fortunes of this country.