A grand total of six European Union states have “confirmed their interest” in taking migrants from Malta under resettlement schemes.
A spokesman from the Interior Ministry described the news of the European Commission’s proposed pilot project as being a step forward. But is it the case?
Joe Public does not seem too encouraged or enamoured with this latest piece of news, and this newspaper also has its reservations.
For starters, let us not forget that this is an EC -“proposed” pilot project. In other words, it is still on the table for discussion. Secondly, only six out of a total of 27 European Union member states have actually decided that they are interested.
And thirdly, and by no means the least important of these points, is that the six states mentioned have merely confirmed their “interest” in the project.
Just what exactly does “interested” mean? Does it mean that they want to know what the project is all about? Does it mean that they are interested in taking a number of immigrants voluntarily?
The scheme apparently involves financial aid for participating countries based on the number of immigrants to be settled. This comes in the wake of a commission announcement last June saying that events in the Mediterranean “underline the urgency of strengthening efforts to prevent and combat illegal immigration in an efficient manner, and thus preventing further human tragedies”.
What a load of hogwash. The only reason that any countries have expressed any interest in the scheme is because cash grants are involved. All the while, we should remember that the European Union is built on the “fundamental principle of solidarity”. So where is that fundamental principle in all this?
We, for starters, cannot see any solidarity here. So far France has taken 100 and has committed itself to take 100 more. Holland, Germany, Ireland and Portugal have taken 85 between them. We thank you. The United States, not a member of the EU, has taken 300 and has pledged to take more.
Where is the so-called ‘family-bond’ we were promised? Where is the solidarity? All this time, autumn is approaching and our boys in the AFM (with help admittedly) are risking life and limb on the high seas to rescue more boat people.
Maltese people are being branded with the general tag of being racist. Italy has tried to bully us, only for their shortcomings to emerge, not that we do not have our own of course. Humanitarian organizations have come to our shores and accused us of treating people worse than dogs. It might not all be perfect, but surely, tiny Malta cannot be expected to deal with this problem and put up with such continued abuse.
The Interior Ministry says there are another six countries who are interested in taking migrants from Malta and two are understood to be ‘big players’. Well, the government might not be surprised at the fact that the people of Malta simply do not believe it. They do not believe that the EC, the EP or any other European institution will offer the support which we so badly need.
We truly hope that some concrete assistance in the form of resettling migrants will be given. But we certainly hope that it will not be along the lines (in terms of numbers) of the voluntary burden-sharing scheme. In hindsight, it was not a good move to accept the proposal as we got fobbed off for a year and are now playing catch-up. Hopefully, we will get something out of this deal (if it comes off) and we appreciate that the Interior Ministry will pull out all the stops to get it off the ground. In the meantime we wait, without much optimism.