Journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia has said that she will not be intimidated by the 19 libel cases filed by the db Group over articles she has published.

Over the past days, Daphne Caruana Galizia published a number of articles - on her own website - regarding the db Group's ITS site investment, and also about Silvio Debono (the man behind the group) and allegations that he travelled abroad with a Director within the Office of the Commissioner for Revenue. 

db Group reached a deal with the government regarding the development of the ITS site in Paceville. The db San Gorg Property Limited will be investing €300 million in the building of a Hard Rock hotel, a residential complex and commercial centre on the former ITS site in St George's Bay.

db Group this morning said it had filed 19 libel cases against the blogger.

In her statement, Daphne Caruana Galizia said that the libel suits against her were filed yesterday, and are all about the same subject, "taking advantage of the fact that the law allows them to sue for each comment, article or blog-post even if the subject matter and the author are the same."

“As we have seen from his involvement with both political parties and several politicians who he pays for services rendered, Debono has a lot of money to throw at his objective of silencing criticism of his choices, behaviour and the exceptional treatment he has got from this government, which has given him - and for a risible sum - a large piece of public land in a prime area, which he will now use for speculation on blocks of flats.

“Because he cannot buy my silence by paying me for my ‘professional services’, as he has done with others, Debono has taken another tack: using that money to hit me with a record-breaking number of libel suits. He doesn't have a leg to stand on, but this is not the issue here. The cases will drag through the courts, it will cost me around €8,000 merely to file my responses, and anybody else would have been intimidated into submission. But that is not going to work where I am concerned.”

She said that the law does not protect journalists in this situation because one does not need grounds to sue. "You only need grounds to win. In the process, there is no prima facie assessment of whether there are grounds or not. This means that an aggressor who feels himself threatened and wishes to intimidate journalists and critics - a politician like Christian Cardona, for example, or a business operator like Silvio Debono - can file multiple libel suits as an extreme form of harassment in and of itself.

“They do not do this to protect their reputation, because their reputation is actually far more badly damaged by such grave acts of aggression against those who hold them to scrutiny and criticise their behaviour. They do it to silence criticism through fear and intimidation. This is consonant with the fact that we in Malta are now living in a culture of fear.”

In their statement published earlier today, the db Group, through CEO Arthur Gauci (above), said that they did not take the decision to file the 19 libel cases "lightly or rashly, and it remains one which we, as a commercial entity, would have preferred not to take. But Daphne Caruana Galizia left us no course to take but this one,” the group said in a statement.

The db Group argued that "For weeks on end she has attacked, slandered and lied about our Group and the people associated with it without a shred of decency, the group said. She writes as if the laws which exist in any European democracy to protect citizens from such abominations do not apply to her. Clearly, she thinks that we should not enjoy the benefit of these laws which protect us and our rights." 

"Damages we might be awarded by the courts will go to charity," the group said.

Daphne Caruana Galizia, in her statement, said to the contrary, "they would love to do far more than sue for libel, and that their problem was not moral prevarication over whether they should file 19 libel suits or not, but finding a lawyer who would carry out their perverse brief.”

“The same statement also says that ‘for weeks on end’ I have ‘attacked, slandered and lied’ about them. This is patently untrue. The matter blew up as a public-interest issue only a week ago, and it is the past week's blog-posts that have really bothered them because they are so close to the bone. Debono is working hard to damage his own reputation in the run-up to the bond issue on which his project depends, and he doesn't need my help in doing it. Also, as Debono and his people will find when the matter finally goes to court, opinions based on facts are not lies and nor are they libel.”

Daphne Caruana Galizia said that in any other European democracy "it would not have been possible for Silvio Debono to do what he has done over several years, and it would certainly not have been possible for him to acquire such a large tract of prime-area public land, removing an important public college for the purpose, through his close connections with the party in government, and then also buy the silence of the deputy Opposition leader through paying him for his professional services on the same deal. European democracies protect ordinary citizens and journalists from the depredations of individuals like Debono and the politicians who protect and serve him."

"Debono says that if the courts award him damages, he will give the money to charity. He needn't wait for that. He should give a great deal of money to charity right now, instead of giving it to political parties and spending it on a Maserati car and an over-sized yacht."