This has nothing to do at all with virility issues but it says much about how Malta is finding that even its best of friends are letting it down badly and regularly in the hour of need on illegal immigration issues.

Until recently one would have thought that EU indifference towards us could be due to the fact that the Nordic and Central Europeans could not be bothered with an issue that is far from close to home for them.

But in the past weeks we have had various repeated occasions that show that Italy – of all countries – has been flagrantly disregarding solidarity towards us by flouting not only international law and EU regulations but also sheer common sense when it has stubbornly and insensitively refused entry to a boatload of some 66 illegal immigrants even though they were four times closer to the Italian island of Lampedusa than to Malta.

The government’s lame excuse that it decided to take them on board itself for strictly humanitarian reasons was a round about way of admitting that it had to cave in to Italy’s macho approach.

The statement that the government would be ‘communicating’ with the Italian government about the incident adds more fuel to the fire of frustration, showing that in these dire moments we have shown a strong touch of political impotence, while the Italian media (Corriere della Sera) clamored triumphantly “Motovedetta maltese con 66 migranti punta su lampedusa: l’Italia dice no”.

This is nothing but Pinar revisited from the Italian side.

Blaming it on Roberto Maroni’s extremism as the Maltese government has sheepishly tried to do or even worse on the fact that one can understand that the Italians are in an election mode right now, is merely a roundabout way of trying to justify Italy’s unacceptable behaviour towards us.

Why are we so weak and politically impotent that we invariably try to play down Italy’s cheeky behaviour when they barely stopped short of insulting us when they claimed as they did last week that they chose not to intervene because they had no vessels available?

The distress call was originally addressed by the immigrants to Italy and it was the Italian Berlusconi government that quickly passed the buck to us.

So much for the warm embraces between Lawrence Gonzi and Silvio Berlusconi whenever they meet during European summitry.

Next time they meet rather than posing for photo opportunities Lawrence Gonzi must show the firmness one expects from any prime minister by telling Berlusconi where to get off, and that the Berlusconi administration rather than flexing its muscles in our regard should at least have the decency to accept arguably the most basic principle – that rescued migrants should be taken to the nearest safe port from the location they are rescued from.

Interestingly although the Italians did not have vessels available for a rescue operation, they did have naval vessels to refuse entry to the P-51 patrol boat – one from the coast guard and the other from the Guardia di Finanza just off Lampedusa.

Whatever the government may have said since then it is deplorable that in its first reaction it has said very little about this latest issue, and a press statement by the armed forces did not even mention Italy.

It is little consolation to learn that according to Minister Tonio Borg if a similar but even worse humanitarian situation arose again Malta would hold its ground, and it would be Italy’s’ responsibility.

No wonder that when another English newspaper’s correspondent tried to contact the Foreign Ministry last Thursday the ministry chose not to comment.

Last week the PN media remarked that in a recent speech Joseph Muscat had dedicated only a few minutes of an address of his to the illegal immigration issue.

This is but a knee jerk reaction to try and make people forget that it was Labour that took the lead by putting illegal immigration centre stage in the House of Representatives and by coming up with a set of concrete proposals on how this long festering problem needs to be addressed frontally.

All this goes to prove that not only are we being let down by many European countries on this issue – even more so in the wake of the strong solidarity shown by the US government – but even worse we are being let down by a leading ‘sister’ government in the EPP movement that Lawrence Gonzi forms part of.

Political impotence (2)

There was much media hype about the Maltese government having sent a strongly worded note verbale to the Italian government together with a plea to take back the illegal immigrants that were forced upon us due to Italy’s approach. This is reactive behaviour of the worst kind. If one had to dig into the records of any Foreign Ministry one would come across a flourish of note verbales sent out to various governments, friendly or not, on a hundred and one issues.

For the uninitiated, a note verbale might sound pompous in name but all it boils down to as its informal name of a 3rd party note (TPN) implies, is that it is nothing but an unsigned diplomatic note written in the third person that is considered to be less formal than an official note but a bit more formal than an aide memoire.

I am saying so in the hope that readers will not be misled by the government’s rearguard action. Even the fact that the government took almost 24 hours to react and that the Prime Minister did not have the political courage to speak up clearly and boldly during the PN’s May Day celebrations both speak for themselves.

Political impotence (3)

Following the l-orrizont scoop revealing that a serving diplomat who is still working on a contract basis with the Foreign Affairs Ministry on immigration issues had 38 years ago allegedly indulged in what sounds like behaviour tantamount to treason by acting as a quisling for the British government at a sensitive moment when Malta was navigating through delicate waters under a new administration that was trying to restructure the geo strategic balance of our external relations, we ended up feeling politically impotent once again as a country.

The least one would have expected from the Prime Minister would have been to suspend the person involved with immediate effect pending further investigations although it is common knowledge that the information was gleaned from the Public Records’ Office. Instead ‘our’ Prime Minister tried to play the whole incident down by stating that:

– this is a 38-year-old incident;

– investigations are still underway;

– the employee is not carrying out full diplomatic duties but merely facilitating the exit from Malta of irregular immigrants in a recently established government entity or unit.

It is a known fact that the person involved has always tried to cling to key diplomatic posts. He did so under a Labour administration in 96-98. He tried to make approaches towards us when the prospects of a Labour victory were still quite strong in 08 and I have reason to believe that until recently he was also allegedly lobbying hard to try and secure yet another diplomatic posting.

Government’s behaviour on this issue is yet another sign of political impotence and sheer opportunism.

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