Updated at 8.35pm

Cries of “justice” rang through the streets of Valletta on Saturday evening as activists held a protest against government corruption.

Organised by civil society groups Repubblika and Occupy Justice, Saturday’s demonstration was also endorsed by the Nationalist Party, Democratic Party and Alternattiva Demokratika. 

Hundreds gathered outside the old Opera House at 7pm and from there prepared to walk down Republic Street towards a makeshift memorial to assassinated journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia outside the law courts.

There, a selection of activists spoke to the crowd, which at that stage stretched from the law courts building to past the Republic Street intersection with St John Street.  

Saturday’s event marked 25 months to the day since the car bomb assassination of Ms Caruana Galizia. Her mourning parents and siblings were among those at the front of Saturday's protest. 

As they walked behind a banner emblazoned with the phrase "no to corruption", people chanted refrains in Maltese.

"Time to get out, crooks,” they cried.  

Many carried placards decrying Malta as a "mafia state" or saying "they're robbing our children of their future". 

PN presence

Similar events organised by the same civil society groups have not only been critical of the Labour government but have also had harsh words for the PN’s current leadership, led by Adrian Delia.    

Despite this, Dr Delia was among those marching on Saturday evening. The party said last Thursday that its administrative committee had agreed to back the protest. 

Chief among the protesters’ concerns are allegations of corruption leveled at the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Keith Schembri.  

On Tuesday, Mr Schembri dropped a defamation suit he had filed against the former PN leader after he had been ordered by a magistrate to testify under oath about claims regarding Dubai company 17 Black, which Mr Schembri has previously said was included in “draft business plans” for his private firms. 

A leaked email indicated that 17 Black was listed as a “target client” for offshore companies belonging to Mr Schembri and minister Konrad Mizzi. 

'Keith Schembri is corrupt'

Blogger-journalist Manuel Delia, one of the event’s organisers, was first to take the stage following the march. 
 
Flanked by the courthouse to his right and the makeshift memorial to Ms Caruana Galizia at the foot of the Great Siege Monument to his left, Mr Delia exclaimed “Daphne was right!”. 

His speech turned to the allegations surrounding Mr Schembri, eliciting a roar from the audience. 

Mr Delia shouted out “Keith Schembri is corrupt”, with the crowd repeating it over and over. 

“Now come over her and file libel proceedings against us all!” he dared he prime minister's chief of staff. 

Student and lawyer Petra Caruana was next to take to the stage, asking whether honesty in politics was "too much to ask:. 

Lawyer and blogger Jacques Rene Zammit told the crowd that although there were politicians ready to drink from the well of all that was wrong, there were others ready to oppose them.

 

Repubblika president Vicki Ann Cremona lashed out at the spread of misinformation by party-owned media. 

Journalists’ role was not to protect those in power, she said, but to ask tough questions and elicit honest replies.

Former PN executive president Mark Anthony Sammut urged MPs to have their say in a vote on Mr Schembri in parliament.

He knew better than most what it meant to speak up against one’s own political group, he told the crowd.  

“But if you choose to be led by duty and not self interest, you can take hard decisions and continue to work in that same group going forward,” he said.

Mr Sammut was part of a group of PN members who sought a vote of no confidence in party leader Dr Delia earlier this year.

Mezzo soprano Claire Ghigo performed a piece previously performed in remembrance of slain Slovakian journalist Jan Kuciak.