I was not surprised that Leo Brincat sounded so taken aback by the fact that a “NET TV anchorman” dared criticise the Nationalist government. Something like that would be totally alien to him, coming from a party run like an army barracks.

Unlike Leo, I don’t belong to any party. I have the freedom to comment, without the fear of any consequences. I will not take up precious space by quoting several examples in recent years of true Labourites who fell foul of Alfred Sant and acolytes for daring to raise their voice in disagreement and who had to pay the price.

Leo did his worst to mangle, beyond recognition, one of two articles I wrote for di-ve.com about the political situation in Malta, quoting selectively, allegedly “to be fair to both the author and to the readers” but, in truth, to give a very personal version of my writings. I will now offer a few quotes of my own that will clearly indicate who my articles were directed at.

In describing as a sign of government weakness the government’s offer to the opposition to set the parliamentary agenda itself now and again, I also wrote:

“The opposition cocked a snoot at the government and, according to Joe Mizzi, did not tackle the (Giuseppe Mifsud Bonnici) report (to amend the standing orders of the House) because ‘there were other more important issues to deal with’. For an opposition that washes its hands of everything that has even remotely to do with better governance for the country, that, indeed, was a strange statement by the Labour Whip.”

I also wrote “For several months there has been a visible manhunt for people close to Sant in an attempt to integrate them into boardrooms, to give them contracts and to ask for their paid services by those who may have done the same, for years, with those close to the current administration. Much of this is hidden from view. No one knows, for instance, what consultancies certain Labour MPs have been getting and what kind of contracts they have been participating in. One is also comforted in these conclusions by the odd story that leaks in the press of mega deals in which prominent Labour MPs are involved... The same has been and probably still is happening with MPs from the government side and perhaps even more so but none of this ever seems to leak out.

“I am not suggesting anything untoward by these MPs or by other Labour or Nationalist professionals. I am just stating what I have been reliably informed by people in the know”.

More quotes from my articles:

“The one clear fact that remains is that two years (left before the election) are one hell of a long time in politics... What is quite apparent is that, in spite of all its efforts, Labour does not seem to be making a great deal of headway.”

The real thrust of my writing, not the one that Leo tried to convey, was this:

“More prominent Labourites will be headhunted in the coming weeks as entrepreneurs play the only game they know – that of keeping both parties quiet – either by contributing financially to both at election time or by spreading appointments within their companies equally between Labourites and Nationalists who can put in a good word for the company and its investors with the parties.

This is the pitiable state of affairs that degenerate politics practiced in this country have reduced our civil society to. Malta’s civil society, which should provide the steady, solid backbone for the country to be able to stand upright and firm, has been reduced to a subservient player, a

follower, not a provider of leadership for the politicians to emulate and to follow.”

And, finally:

“There is one more sign that Labour may already feel that they are in. Some prominent members of the opposition have turned quite cold and many noses are up in the air already. I would imagine that at the height of their nostrils the air must be freezing cold. Watch out for hypothermia guys!”

Unlike me, a “NET TV anchorman with a regular widely-followed weekly chat show” to quote Leo Brincat, he is a very busy man so I will spare him the exercise of determining who I was referring to. When I wrote that, I had Labour MPs like him in mind.

There will come a time when even moderates like Leo Brincat will come to understand the difference between criticising Labour and criticising the Nationalists in the press and elsewhere.

I may not get another invitation from the Prime Minister’s secretary for a chat this time round for this critical article but if Leo wanted to focus the attention of the Nationalist bigwigs on my articles, he needn’t have bothered. I am well aware that my articles, as are my TV programmes for NET TV, are widely followed by both sides of the political fence.

Let me just tell him something he doesn’t know. Over the six years that I have presented and produced my TV shows for NET, we never even once discussed a written contract, let alone signed one. Our relationship has been and still is built on trust and mutual respect. When the time will come to disengage, and that will necessarily come to pass, it will happen in the same spirit that has motivated our relationship for all these years and not because of any recriminations that Leo Brincat may have attempted to fire up with his “revelations”.