From Mrs E. Barbaro Sant

Desmond Zammit Marmarà’s article “The truth about Labour’s past” (ToM, 28 June) brings to mind other incidents that occurred during the Labour regime other than those he listed.

I agree with him that episodes of the like he mentioned on that particular morning of Monday 15 October 1979 and nicknamed Black Monday, were shameful and condemnable to say the least. The same could be said of members of the police force who allied themselves with diehard and violent Labourites to insult and beat Nationalist Party supporters. I can’t forget the face covered with blood of my late dear friend Rose Galea Testaferrata of Mdina, who had her nose bitten just because she was going to the PN meeting at Tal-Barrani. Even the thought of it, over 20 years later, still gives me the shivers.

Like her, there were others who were insulted and beaten simply because they were celebrating Independence Day in Valletta – something which every citizen worthy of his name has the right to do in a democratic country.

Zammit Marmarà thinks that “it was only a small group of Labour supporters who instigated and carried out these acts of violence”. I agree that not all Labour supporters were in favour of such shameful behaviour, not even, I dare say, the leaders of the party. This confirms beyond any doubt how members of the Police Corps were manipulated and how the blame lay on two or three ministers who instigated such violence, as he rightly states. But, since the souls of these ministers are now resting in peace, I will refrain from mentioning any names, even though we, as a family, had to suffer because of their wrongdoings.

Reading the excellent autobiography “The Politics of Persuasion” by President Emeritus Dr Guido de Marco, I could not believe that our beloved Malta went through so much during Mintoff’s regime, even though I personally was very much involved in politics. As a family, we also had our share of Labour violence. Here I will mention only a few of them, even though I would rather forget all about them completely.

Way back in June 1980, during the Mnarja protest, my 15-year-old daughter was crossing Rotunda Square in Mosta, on her way home from her music lesson, when all of a sudden, a group of men who were in the balcony of the Labour Party club, called her by her surname and barracked her with insults and foul language. Luckily, a family friend, who happened to witness all this, offered to accompany her home as the girl was terrified beyond description. A few days later, her younger sister, aged 10 at the time, was crossing the same square and was spat on from the same premises.

On election day in 1976, my late husband and I were queuing near the Mosta Primary School to vote. All of a sudden, from the end of the queue, we heard our surname being called, together with some very colourful non-Oxford vocabulary, and accompanied by the noun “assassini”. The smart thing about this is that he was not stopped neither by MLP contestants who were very nearby, nor by the policemen on duty. The owner of the voice was gallantly ordering us to leave the queue. I turned round and facing the man who had yelled, I calmly replied that we would gladly do so once we had exercised our duty. After a few minutes, a police officer offered to escort us to the Polling Booth to vote.

This was not all. One Sunday morning, the Labour Brigade Band was scheduled to play around the streets of Mosta. They stopped in the square where we lived and looking at our balcony, started singing Labour hymns, calling us by the family name and asking us to have the courage to come out. We were in Gozo for the day.

Another episode, which keeps coming to mind every time I hear his name being mentioned in the media, is one which took place in the street where we lived for many years. Just a few doors up from ours’, a group of men were busy fixing some lemons to the branches of a tree in an open truck. As I drove past them, I heard the voice of a young boy calling out “lumi”. I was sure that it was directed at me, since there was no one else around. The Labour Party had won the General Election and they were preparing to celebrate. I somehow sensed that if I drove past them again, this would be repeated, but I also believed that I had every right to drive home my usual way without being hindered by anyone. I have never insulted anybody either by writing or verbally. Driving past, the same young voice called out “lumi” again and I said to myself that this was too much to tolerate, that I had had more than enough of this nonsense and that this had to stop once and for all. Calmly, I got out of the car and called the boy: “Isma, sabih”. He was terrified as, I presume, he realised that what he had done was wrong. I spoke to him loud enough for the men on the truck to hear me. I told him to tell the guys on the truck that I will take the “lumi” when I please and not when they fancy. Immediately, his grandfather came to me, put his hand on my shoulder, excused himself and said that this would not be repeated. That young boy is today’s re-elected Secretary General of the Malta Labour Party Jason Micallef. Since then, our paths have never crossed, but there is great respect between the families.

I believe that for Mr Zammit Marmara` to state that “the PN did not encourage violence, but neither did it do anything to stop it”, is not correct. When Dr Eddie Fenech Adami led the PN as Leader of the Opposition as well as Prime Minister, he always appealed for reconciliation and or respect among the Maltese as we were one nation. Reconciliation was always the theme of his messages. His views were shared by the whole PN administration – Dr Guido De Marco, Dr Louis Galea, Dr Ugo Mifsud Bonnici and the rest. And I feel that the Maltese people, regardless of their political colour and creed, owe a lot to these statesmen.

I agree that Dr Alfred Sant, former Leader of the Malta Labour Party continued to strengthen that belief and to restrain violent elements within the Party.

I sincerely augur that Malta will never again pass through that black period of its history, no matter who leads the political parties.

Emily Barbaro Sant

MOSTA