Over the last few weeks we have come to learn about three different letters which are totally unrelated.

The first was the letter by the President of the Republic to Libyan Leader Gaddafi.

The second was the letter of resignation by former Nationalist Minister Michael Falzon from chairman of the Water Services Corporation.

And the third is the recent letter of resignation by John Camilleri, chairman of the PBS editorial board.

Although, as I mentioned, the three letters have nothing to do with each other they seem to have something in common.

They all tend to cast light on the covert manner in which this government tends to operate.

Letter No. 1 – To Libyan Leader Gaddafi. Had this been an ordinary letter between the Maltese President and the Libyan Leader I would not have tried to make an issue out of it. But given that the Foreign Affairs Minister chose to quote snippets of this letter in a DOI press release just after having hand delivered it personally to the Libyan Leader, it intrigued me to find out what the whole letter said.

This is particularly since, according to the DOI, it touched on such delicate issues as irregular immigration and joint oil exploration, among other subjects. Given that the minister chose to enlighten us about the fact that during his meeting with the Libyan Leader he discussed the contents of the letter, I felt that since the executive had made its own a letter by the President of the Republic, then the least we could have expected was for the DOI to publish the full text of the letter.

Unfortunately although I issued a formal media release requesting its publication, my request was met with a stony silence. I should have known better because the same attitude repeated itself when I asked the Foreign Affairs Minister to confirm whether the double taxation and visa waiver issues had been included in our Ambassador to the US’s credentials’ written address to President George W Bush. All we were told was that our Ambassador did raise the issue with the US President but so far I am still waiting for the Foreign Minister to either confirm whether the issues were specifically referred to in the written speech or to say what could be holding the DOI back from publishing the text of Ambassador Miceli Farrugia’s address to the American President.

Which brings us to Letter No. 2 – Michael Falzon’s letter of resignation from the Water Services Corporation chairmanship, which, as every one knows has since been withdrawn. Apart from the fact that by the time of writing, the government has held back from accepting the Opposition Leader’s specific demand that there should be an inquiry about the whole saga leading to the chairman’s resignation, there are various aspects worth pondering upon and probing further.

Is it true that regardless of who the contractors involved may be, although the projects in question are likely to lead to cost over-runs and considerable delays, for some reason up to a certain stage no procedures had been initiated against them? Has the situation changed since then?

Is it true that we could be risking losing EU funds allocated to the Gozo project and Italian Protocol funds allocated to the Mellieha project?

Unless the WSC can prove that by the time the chairman offered to resign no procedures had been initiated against those concerned, does this mean that they are now also free to tender as if nothing had happened, for the South Treatment Plant which is budgeted at circa Lm27 million?

I have had confidential reports which the WSC chairman may wish to ignore, confirm or deny that prior to the ‘conciliatory’ meeting between Mr Falzon and Minister Gatt, pressure was brought to bear by the PM himself (and possibly by a leading PN campaign strategist) for them to resolve this spat and not to open new polemical fronts for the party in government.

In the same breath I would also like to ask whether it is true or false that at some stage the minister had reportedly accused the WSC chairman of leaking his resignation to the media in retaliation?

Is it true that the minister first got to know about Mr Falzon’s resignation from Super 1 radio?

Could this have triggered the minister’s decision to go ahead and publish the exchange of correspondence between his ministry and the corporation?

Although I prefer to reach my own conclusions after hearing what the ministry and/or the WSC have to say, there is no doubt that there was logic to the reports that the PM had been pressing hard for a positive solution as he could ill afford further political damage at this delicate stage.

On the other hand one cannot exclude the fact that former Minister Falzon earned himself a lot of support from party insiders in the process, which is understandable, given the fact that he has militated in the party for a lengthy period of time and, apart from being a regular political columnist, is still a media anchorman on the PN’s Radio 101 Sunday mornings news analysis programmes.

Although the issue seems to have been ‘resolved’ or rather ‘papered over’ it could be that in the final analysis the minister was wrong for the attitude he adopted but possibly right if reports I have prove to be true, that the cost variations were until then being treated with a high degree of nonchalance by the WSC.

Some might argue that I am indulging in far too many rumours and insinuations. Unfortunately unless we have clear-cut clarifications, mystery will continue to cloud the air.

Which brings me to Letter No. 3 – The resignation of PBS editorial board chairman John Camilleri – which contrary to Michael Falzon’s letter of resignation – was accepted immediately “with regret” by Minister Gatt.

I definitely hold no brief for Mr Camilleri. Although I have nothing personal against him I very much understand and support the reservations that my party had against his appointment in the first place because of his political “baggage”. But some of the accusations he made against the ministry and the board of directors of TVM cannot be treated lightly.

His accusation that the programme selection process as adopted by the board of directors was neither fair, nor transparent or credible, gained in momentum when he then went on to insist that the board actually went against the same rules it had set out in the Public Statement of Intent.

Although I do not have a copy of the statement of intent, while the minister is continuing to argue that the board was merely consultative, the outgoing PBS editorial board chairman stated that the said statement says that all proposals will be evaluated by the editorial board from the perspective of content, while on the other hand the evaluation will be presented to the board of directors which will, in conjunction with (please note…not in consultation with) the editorial board, take the final decision about which programmes will form part of the schedule.

For a former senior PN party official to accuse the majority of the present board of directors of TVM to have brought national public broadcasting into this miserable state is no catchpenny accusation.

Editorial board director Dominic Fenech could not have been more categorical than when he stated that if the minister wants to back a board (of directors) that is challenging the very policy set by himself then he should change the policy.

While the ultimate insult for the editorial board was to realise that they did not even have the official programme schedule as decided by the directors, everyone knows who the ultimate winners seem to be.

The producers of certain farmed out TV programmes, who seem to include people (or should I say a particular company) that are reported to have carried out various assignments for a number of government ministries on a consultancy basis apart from reports that its front man/men never denied reports that they sit or sat on strategy group/team sittings of the Nationalist Party itself. Formally or informally. Or else in session with individual members of the said strategy team.

I dread to imagine how certain programmes could be manipulated in the months to come in the run up to the general elections.

Time will hopefully prove me right or wrong.

Meanwhile the taxpayer will continue to pay the price for the latest decision by the PBS board of directors to apparently scrap the editorial board’s short list and re-open the applications process from scratch.

Whether this was done to accommodate the company I mentioned above, together with others who might even have close relatives sitting on the PBS board of directors, is only something we will find out very shortly.

Just a little more time and patience will do the trick.

Solidarity with Air Malta pilots

Although Air Malta operations do not form part of my brief, I have been approached by and met a number of Air Malta pilots who feel utterly disappointed at the way they are being treated by the national airline. One of them argued that while Labour governments of the 1980s had introduced a wage and price freeze, this government has gone so far as to introduce wage cuts in their regard given the way some of their allowances have been slashed.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was that although certain low cost carriers like Ryanair are known to be somewhat stingy and excessively cost-conscious, I was told by these same sources that they still pay their pilots far more than Air Malta does.

Through parliamentary questions of mine the general public came to find out about the alarming number of pilots who have resigned over the last three years both from Air Malta itself as well as from its UK base.

Whoever is taking certain rash decisions, possibly at ministry level, seems to be ignoring the fact that due to the heavy demand for trained pilots worldwide practically all major airlines are facing a situation where they actually have to give in for pushed up pay packages and improved working conditions for these people.

Although the Minister tried to give the impression in Parliament that there is no shortage of pilots at Air Malta, the difficulty many of them have been facing in taking their full leave entitlement indicates or suggests otherwise.

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Leo Brincat is the opposition spokesman for foreign affairs and IT