Please allow me to reply to Mr Mario Mifsud’s letter (Whither Malta? TMIS, 1 December). Your correspondent, in my opinion, has totally forgotten what makes us Maltese! He confuses the attainment of political independence in 1964 with the identity of the Maltese people, which has existed for many centuries!

To Mario Mifsud, having citizenship and a passport is what makes a people. He would have been partly right, if Maltese citizenship and a Maltese passport could only be acquired by people born of Maltese parents. But the reality is totally different. There are thousands of people – from 90 different countries – who have acquired a Maltese passport and citizenship and who cannot be considered to be “Maltese” by any stretch of the imagination! How can we change a Chinese person, a Russian, an Indian, an American, a South African, a Somali, an Ethiopian etc., into a Maltese person, simply because they have qualified – for one of a number of reasons – to acquire a Maltese passport and citizenship?

Mr Mifsud argues: “There could be no sovereign and independent Malta without citizenship…”, but then loses the whole plot when he continues: “Maltese citizenship has only existed for 49 years”. Yes, but the Maltese people have existed for centuries. Our Maltese flag has existed for centuries and so has our Maltese language. Our Maltese traditions and our culture have existed for centuries. This is our Maltese heritage, not the passport or citizenship that one can now find in the possession of so many other foreign nationals!

Just as a former PN government extended the possibility of acquiring Maltese citizenship to so many different people from so many different countries, including “stateless” people and others whose country of origin cannot even be confirmed, and for various reasons, including “humanitarian grounds” – and I have nothing against this – surely the present government has as much right to extend the acquiring of a Maltese passport and citizenship to highly talented, super-rich individuals, who would be subjected to the most rigorous due diligence and who would be willing to invest a part of their wealth in the Individual Investors Programme, which will be used for the benefit of both Malta’s economy and financial stability as well as for the benefit of the Maltese people?

In very recent years, the Maltese people have also faced a very important choice: whether to keep outdated ideas and prejudices or choose to break the chain of prejudice. The people chose to break the chain in order that the civil right of divorce can also be enjoyed by those who need this right in our country, despite the many scaremongering stories about Maltese family life coming to an end if the right of divorce is also given to Maltese citizens! Today, one does not even hear the word “divorce”! Rest assured that the same scaremongering stories we are reading and hearing about citizenship and the passport will have the same fate!

The Maltese people today have a similar choice to make. I am very confident that the Maltese people will, once again, not allow the scaremongers to stop this great opportunity, which could really be a “game-changer” for Malta’s economy and financial stability as well as for the Maltese people’s standard of living. The Maltese people cannot – and will not – miss this great opportunity!

Eddy Privitera

MOSTA