The government’s decision to ban the cultivation of genetically modified organisms, better known as GMOs, has been warmly welcomed by local and overseas environmentalists. They have, for too long, been anxious that Europe would, as usual, succumb to the pressure exerted by the global giants.

By availing itself of an EU opt-out clause, the government has joined many other governments and regions in fighting the spread of GMOs on the continent. Given our minuscule land mass, it may seem unimportant to the rest of Europe, but it still forms part of a growing tide against GMOs and the companies that produce them. It also means Malta has been spared the risk and is assured it will remain GM-free. 

There are still elements within the European Union who would willingly and irresponsibly accept continent-wide GMOs if it meant reaping bigger and better economic rewards and to hell with people’s health and other threats. It is of course why an EU law was approved in March, clearing the way for new GMO crops to be approved after years of deadlock. It was only the opposition from environmentalist organisations, level-minded governments and most of the Left everywhere that it was agreed, somewhat reluctantly, to give individual countries the right to ban GMO crops, even after they had been approved by the European Commission.

Maltese environmentalist Martin Galea de Giovanni rightly insisted that “the technology is not only risky, but redundant. People, and the governments that represent them, are rejecting them outright”.

We can’t be naive. Battles have been won on the issue, but the war goes on. It is good, however, to know that we have the authorities on our side.

***

A row and a fuss

As an avowed Republican, I really have never given a hoot about the British royal family, even when I was supposedly their subject, and any other royals anywhere. Still ideologically untagged, I remember hating the very content of an early-primary school textbook which started with the simple but subliminally loaded words in Maltese of: “Pin, int qatt rajt lir-Reġina?” (Pin, have you ever seen the Queen?), as if having seen the Queen was, then, equivalent to seeing a solar eclipse or a Martian landing.

In truth, however, history cannot be ignored. The British Queen’s connection with these islands is documented. My friend and colleague, Frank Attard, a top Press photographer for many a decade, has undoubtedly the best collection of original pictures taken during the time – between 1946 and 1953 – when the then Princess Elizabeth stayed at the villa while her fiancé, and later husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, was stationed in Malta as a serving Royal Navy officer.

Elizabeth and Philip also lived there for a period between 1949 and 1951 – the only foreign country in which the Queen has ever lived. So while we still cherish and restore the palaces and monuments of the Knights and other, even earlier, historical edifices, it makes sense that we need to retain and preserve, possibly rehabilitate, those of the now rapidly fading memory of the British era. Bighi Hospital in Kalkara, where Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando’s MCST is doing a terrific job transforming the whole area into a main Grand Harbour attraction, is the perfect example.

I guess the same goes for the so-called grand villa in Guardamangia that once was the temporary home of the two British royals. But the UK media, ready as ever to dish out funny little royal stories, has lately been claiming that “a row is breaking out in Malta” over Villa Guardamangia which has long been in a state of almost total disrepair.

What row? I would describe it as more of a fuss over a piece of private property which, yes, can be salvaged and, for posterity, put on the long list of historical buildings in Malta, including its lavatory flushings, I guess, and the place where, mamma mia, a prince may possibly have been conceived!

But for people here and the UK to talk about “a row that comes ahead of a royal visit to Malta later this year” is not only an exaggeration, but also pure tripe. If, as reported, the owners of the once beautiful building had turned down a request from the British monarch to see it during her last visit to the island, they had every right to do so.

It is all a question of who will be footing the bill for the extensive restoration work that is required on an otherwise crumbling villa – the owners or the government.

The “row”, it has been claimed, has now forced the Maltese government to issue a statement on the villa saying that it had embarked on a process to restore the property “a long time ago”, hence prior to the current kerfuffle. Surveys on the property have been carried out and restoration cost estimates have been gathered, we were told, but the government has no title on the property, with obvious legal complications.

The same media writing about “the row”, however, reported government’s plans to expropriate the villa, with full compensation to its owners.

End of story. Another building, another era, another tourist attraction. What’s the fuss all about?

***

The devil’s hand

The story of the insipid American teacher who recently forced a four-year-old boy to use his right hand when writing because the left hand is “the devil’s hand” is another incredible episode in the long, ignorant and fundamentalist melodrama so often associated with the Bible belt of the United States. It also took me whole decades back to my infancy.

I am left-handed despite efforts in my early pre-primary school days to make me use my right hand for the same devilish reason. I used to attend a Church school run by a Franciscan order where the sisters, most of them good and well-meaning teachers, did their utmost to convince the minority of left-handers in their midst to switch to the right. Some actually managed it. I stubbornly refused, breaking several pencils in the process.

At that time, you had parents actually asking teachers for this intervention in the pious hope of “doing away” with the devil’s hand, but to find this same psychological absurdity occurring in the 21st century is both disgusting and a confirmation that some ultra-conservative minds never change.

In my case, Sister Pawlina, bless her dark brown habit, soon realised she could not win. I hope it is the same with the poor child, Zayde Sands, whose mother was understandably outraged by the teacher’s mediaeval thinking.

Now where did I leave my pitchfork...