Leo Brincat can very well expect a slew of issues to be raised in his ‘grilling’ before the European Parliament’s Budgetary Control Committee on Monday, but the Panama Papers controversy is certainly not an issue that the environment minister should be concerned about.

Mr Brincat, who has been nominated by the government to fill Malta’s vacancy at the European Court of Auditors, will on Monday seek the approval of the same parliamentary committee MEPs who had rejected Malta’s first choice - Labour Party veteran and deputy leader Toni Abela – by an overwhelming vote of 17-9 last March.

Among the issues Mr Brincat could expect to face will be those related to his performance as Malta’s environment minister and perhaps certain issues related to the use of European Union funds by his ministry during his time at the helm, which is, after all, the core job of those on the ECA - an institution tasked with fighting fiscal corruption.

Some of those questions will be easily answered, others, perhaps, not quite so easily.

But the main question that most people in Malta will be expecting to be raised will be that of how Mr Brincat considers himself to be a suitable candidate for the ECA after he voted in favour of the Konrad Mizzi in the recent no confidence motion raised against him in light of his exposure in the Panama Papers, where he was shown to have opened a secret company in Panama and a secret trust in New Zealand while serving as a Cabinet minister.

The question has been a topical one since Opposition leader Simon Busuttil recently chastised Mr Brincat in Parliament for having voted in line with his party in the no confidence motion against Dr Mizzi last May.  Dr Busuttil made the remark during the debate of that same no confidence motion. The Prime Minister had retorted by describing the comment as a “veiled threat” that the opposition would seek to scuttle Mr Brincat’s chances of emerging successful from Monday’s grilling.

But it must be said that Mr Brincat’s vote against the opposition’s motion of no confidence in Dr Mizzi was not, as the head of Malta’s delegation at the European parliament David Casa recently said, “a vote to protect these individuals [Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri]”.

First of all, both Dr Busuttil and Dr Casa are, shall we say, either being very selective with the truth or suffering from a very selective memory.  Mr Brincat, in voting against the opposition’s no confidence motion against Dr Mizzi, was doing what is required of him given Malta’s form of parliamentary democracy.

In Malta’s parliamentary democracy, MPs are obliged to toe the party line in each and every vote taken in Parliament.  The only exceptions are in cases in which they are given a free vote by their party leader, through the party’s parliamentary whip such as, for example, the free vote given to Nationalist MPs by former party leader Lawrence Gonzi in the divorce vote.

Labour MPs were given no such free vote when it came to the no confidence motion against Dr Mizzi.  It could even be argued that had Mr Brincat rebelled against the party and voted in favour of the opposition’s motion, that he lacks the respect for rules, regulations and protocol expected of a member of the ECA. 

As such, the accusers arguing that Mr Brincat is not a suitable candidate for the ECA because he did vote against party lines and in favour of the opposition’s no confidence motion are being very selective with the truth because politicians and pundits of their calibre know better.

They are also, as said, suffering from a very selective memory.  When former Nationalist MPs Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, Jesmond Mugliett and Franco Debono were blacklisted from contesting future elections under the PN banner, the PN had taken such action precisely because the three MPs had failed to toe the party line in votes on no confidence motions raised by the then opposition Labour Party.  Dr Pullicino Orlando had voted in favour of an opposition no confidence motion against then EU ambassador Richard Cachia Caruana and Mr Mugliett had abstained.  Dr Debono, meanwhile, was banned, at least in part, for his vote in favour of an opposition motion against then Home Affairs Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici.

And yet this is what certain PN politicians, its leader included, and acolytes say they would have expected of Mr Brincat last May when it came to the vote against Konrad Mizzi.  The irony is so tangible it just about leaps up and slaps you in the face.