Mr Justice Lino Farrugia Sacco – who is facing impeachment procedures – will soon retire and be put out to pasture. In doing so, he will have avoided a hearing that could have tarnished his name and reputation. And while one scalp has been saved, another political heavyweight has joined the bench. That person is Mr Justice Wenzu Mintoff, hardly seen in court except for cases which involved him, who was sworn in yesterday.

Mr Justice Mintoff has had a rollercoaster political career. He was a Member of Parliament voted in on the Labour ticket in 1987. But he clashed with the party and left his post as President to set up Alternattiva Demokratika with current PL deputy leader Toni Abela, Reporter’s presenter Saviour Balzan and Xarabank presenter Peppi Azzopardi. He did not resign his seat as an MP and remained in parliament until 1992. After that, he was back in cahoots with the party and was given the post of editor of the PL’s mouthpiece, the newspaper Kulhadd. He held that post while he was also holding the post of legal adviser at Malta Enterprise.

It is also pertinent to know that when his appointment was announced on Wednesday, the Department of Information released a statement containing Judge Mintoff’s biography and although it mentioned that he was an MP and a member of AD, there was no mention of his activism in the Labour Party.

We call a spade a spade. Mr Justice Mintoff’s long colourful past in politics produces only one profile of the man: that of a staunch PL activist who rarely, if ever, acknowledged anything positive in his political adversaries. Conveniently, the Prime Minister has gone on record and said he has full faith in Dr Mintoff, but a number of lawyers have already said that they would renounce any cases that they might have to field before him in court. Are they to blame?

Mr Justice Mintoff said that independence and impartiality will be his credo, adding that each and every case brought before him is not merely a number but represents individuals and their hardships. We certainly hope that this is the case, but we are talking about a judicial appointment of a person that has a number of pending civil libel suits in court. The mere fact that he felt the need to state what is obviously expected of a judge sustains the argument the man needs to struggle to reach a status of impartiality.

To be fair with Judge Mintoff, along with Dr. Toni Abela, he stood up to be counted to labour’s violent past back in the late 1980s.

The main bone of contention in his appointment is directed at the Prime Minister and his cabinet who don’t seem to have had enough of their ‘Taghna Lkoll’ appointments as yet. After doing their utmost to avoid embarrasing Judge Farrugia Sacco and giving him the oportunity to exhaust all avenues to keep him on the bench until retirement age, the Prime Minister is now buying into more trouble for the future with this controversial appointment. And, from what we hear in the corridors of power, this will not be the last of such appointments for there are other promimant Labour activist lawyers who are aiming even higher than Judge Mintoff.  The new Labour government led by Prime Minister Joseph Muscat is very businesslike when it comes to the economy and financial sectors however, it is also giving the impression that old habits die hard and that the mistakes commited by previous labour Prime Ministers are set to be repeated.