Independent MP Marlene Farrugia has changed her mind about attending the Labour Party’s Workers Day activities on 1 May after receiving a telephone call from the President, asking her not to attend due to the “current political situation and the anger in this country at this time”.

Earlier in the day, Dr Farrugia took to Facebook to say that she would be attending the activities. It is unclear whether the President made a personal request, or whether there were any threats made against Dr Farrugia.

Dr Farrugia said that the President did not ask her not to attend capriciously, and she was going to respect her suggestion.

Dr Farrugia said that while she will not be attending the May Day activities, she will be there in spirit with those workers who told her they would appreciate her presence. 

Dr Farrugia attended and addressed the gathering during the protest demonstration organised by the Nationalist Party at Castille Place a few weeks ago.

She resigned from the Labour Party last November and, since then, has upped the tempo in her criticism of the government which had already started before her resignation.

In her original post this morning, Dr Farrugia said that her presence will remind those present that Labour lives and is not the PanamaFonseca gang on stage.

In a second post uploaded this morning, Dr Farrugia said it is not acceptable that the government is led by a Prime Minister who is eating away at democracy with his style of leadership. "He is doing this by what he is doing and by what he is not doing," she wrote.

More than 60 days have passed since it became public knowledge that a minister and government chief of staff had opened a company in Panama, and yet no action has been taken against them.

What is also of concern is what is happening in the police corps, she wrote, after another police commissioner - the fourth - left the position in the last three years.

Do not accept dictatorship, she write. "It is time to speak up before it is too late."