Honestly, there are times when I could kill Alanis Morisette. I mean, irony is a difficult enough concept to explain without having rock stars bungling it all up for you. Rain? On your wedding day? That’s not ironic. It’s merely unfortunate. And don’t even get me started on those 10,000 spoons...

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But then, maybe I’m being a little hard on Alanis. After all, she was born and raised in Ottawa, Canada. What could she possibly know about irony? Now, had she been born and raised in Malta, I reckon it would have been a whole different ball game. Here are a few reasons why...

Sluggishness? The EU?

This week, The Times carried an article under the following headline: Deputy Prime Minister laments EU sluggishness

It just so happened that I read this story online, with the unfortunate result that – having been in the process of taking a large gulp of coffee at the time – I had to clean my monitor afterwards. Sluggishness? The EU? Now what colour did the pot call the kettle again?

Anyhow: it is clear that to me that the overwhelming irony in that headline was lost on the author of that article, if not on the editor of that newspaper. Which means that, in all fairness, I wouldn’t blame Alanis Morisette for not picking it up.

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In case you wondering, Alanis, the man who’s just accused the EU of being “sluggish” and “not taking any action” is a certain Dr Tonio Borg. So let’s just rewind a little, shall we? I seem to remember how, around February of this year – a month or so after the infamous incident at Hal Safi – the same Dr Tonio Borg finally got round to organising his very own National Conference on Immigration, for which I had the dubious pleasure of being present.

Please note, folks, that the emphasis in the above sentence should fall on the word “finally” – which is a shorter way of saying “after being begged, bribed, pushed, pressurised, cajoled, browbeaten and ultimately bullied into doing what he clearly did not want to do.”

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But back to the conference... which, I am pleased to report, was an overwhelming success. If, that is, the objective was to stage-manage the perfect photo opportunity for our indefatigable Department of Information (more of this later), to publish a nice, glossy magazine, and to enjoy a very good lunch at the Intercontinental Hotel. In terms of its overall impact on the immigration phenomenon, however... well, let’s just say we may as well have gone all out for the weekend on the Fernandes.

Afterwards, days became weeks became months before it was “finally” (see above paragraph) announced that – lo and behold – the government was setting up a “task force” to examine the problem. A task force presided over by none other than – Dr Tonio Borg.

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Two months later, while this task force was presumably still busy “examining the problem”, no fewer than 250 immigrants landed on the same day. I need hardly add that this particular development had been widely predicted and expected for years. But of course, it seems to have taken us completely by surprise.

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This brings us to the present state of affairs. As I write this column on a hot and humid summer afternoon, the government is still officially “looking at possible venues” to be converted to house immigrants. Immigrants who – as has been widely predicted for years (by all the people who have been clamouring for the government to address this problem with the seriousness it deserves) – are now arriving in boatloads of up to 200 at a go. Tonio Borg’s response? We’ll set up an “emergency task force”, of course. Yes, indeed. After all, if the original task force doesn’t manage to complete any visible task, we’ll just create an “emergency” version instead. And what happens, pray tell, if the “emergency task force” proves to be as ineffective as the original? Will we replace it with a “crisis task force” instead? And if that fails? I know! We’ll complain to the EU. We’ll blame everybody other than ourselves for failing to take any action whatsoever. At a stretch, we’ll give an interview to The Financial Times, in which we’ll moan and groan about how “sluggish” the EU is, and how “slow to respond” it has proved to be.

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I hope you’re listening to all this, Alanis. And I hope you’re taking notes, too.

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Here’s another example for you. Ever heard of Sea Malta (Or, as a wiser and wittier acquaintance put it: “Now you ‘Sea Malta’, now you don’t?”)

No, of course you haven’t. Anyway, for your information, Sea Malta is but one of several state-owned corporations that the government seems desperately anxious to get rid of. Among the others, you will find such illustrious names as The Malta Drydocks and Malta Shipbuilding, as well Enemalta, Maltacom, Water Services Corporation, etc., You will also find that they do not figure in a register of the world’s most profitable. Some of them, in fact, have reported cumulative losses running into untold millions of liri.

Now, in all these years of government-owned enterprises losing money, I don’t recall a single instance of anyone in government requesting an inquiry into the finances of these and other entities.

And suddenly, jumping jeepers! What does Sea Malta go and do? It declares a profit, that’s what. I mean, of all the cheek. At a time when the Minister is personally supervising the privatisation process, it suddenly transpires that we’ll be retaining all the money-losers, and selling about the only one of the lot of them to have actually been profitable last year. The Minister’s response? He orders an inquiry, of course. We’ll get to the bottom of this, he said. We’ll find out how this little pipsqueak company managed to upset all our fine privatisation plans. Don’t they know that we only tolerate state-owned companies if they cost us millions of pounds each year?

That’s right, Austin, you show them who’s boss...

Transparency, anyone?

And now for something else. One of the fun aspects of being a journalist in Europe’s least transparent member State is that you get to see all the Department of Information press releases before anyone else. In other words, you get a rare insight into what the authorities deem important for the press, and consequently the general public, to know.

Needless to add, these DOI press releases invariably make riveting reading. For instance, did you know that, last week, the President of the Republic received an official visit from the President of the Federation of Playing Fields’ Associations? And that in the course of this meeting, he was presented with a commemorative plaque? No, I didn’t either. Thank goodness, then, that we have a Department of Information to fill these glaring lacunae in our collective consciousness. Otherwise, we would be living in blissful ignorance of these and other weighty matters.

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Of course, it is important to understand that the DOI fulfils this vital service out of the goodness of its heart. For in Malta, the government is under no obligation whatsoever to inform anyone of its comings and goings... not to mention how, among other things, it spends our money.

It is equally important to understand that the DOI takes great care not to bother the media unduly with inconsequential matters, choosing instead to only send profoundly newsworthy stuff... for instance, what the Minister for So-and-So said during such and such a press conference, etc. That, presumably, is why there was no official DOI press release to inform the nation that the Council of Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture paid us all a second, unscheduled visit last June... in the course of which, it held meetings with (among others) the Prime Minister, the Minister for Justice and Home Affairs, the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and the Commissioner of Police.

No, of course not. That hardly counts as “important information”, now does it?

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Anyhow... I checked the DOI press releases on the week when all this came out in the press, and... well, I’ll be damned: The President of the Republic was presented with an autographed copy of the authorised biography of Patri Felicjan Bilocca! Honestly, what on earth would we do without the DOI?