Love her or hate her, Mrs Daphne Caruana Galizia is a self-made journalist who has earned a name for herself because of her razor-sharp pen.  Her inquisitive posts, excellent writing skills and investigative competences have led thousands to follow her blog regularly.  

Mrs Caruana Galizia’s Running Commentary is frequently spiced with gossip and explicit photographs of people who, for some reason or other, are in the public arena.  I am not competent to counsel whether the content of the blog is added-value to our small society; you are free to draw your own conclusions.

 But to her credit, she often exposes matters that would have otherwise, more than likely, remained concealed.  She has a network of informers and gives her readers breaking news at any time of the night or day.  

The alleged visit to a brothel while on official duty in Germany of Dr Chris Cardona, the Economy, Investment and Small Business Minister and PL Deputy Leader Party Affairs and of his consultant, Dr Joseph Gerada, has rocked the PL’s political credentials.  Both denied the allegations and, in an attempt to prove their innocence, the gentlemen sought redress in the law courts and filed a number of libel suits against Mrs Caruana Galizia.  For the first time ever, these gentlemen saw fit to exercise their right and asked the court to issue garnishee orders against Mrs Caruana Galizia, freezing €47,000-worth of her assets in advance of the outcome of court proceedings.

The legal recourse sought by Minister Cardona and Dr Gerada is considered by local and foreign institutions as excessive and disproportionate, an opinion with which I concur.  

But equally upsetting was the news item reported on the Malta Independent some days ago wherein it was revealed that, by the end of this month, Sai Mizzi Liang, wife of Minister Konrad Mizzi, would have pocketed some €558,000. Currently, Ms Mizzi holds the position of Special Envoy to Asia for the Malta Enterprise while concurrently fulfilling the duties of Consul General at the Consulate for Malta in Shanghai.  

Although the financial package paid to Ms Mizzi is astronomically excessive, I would perhaps have turned a blind eye had I not last Friday received a detailed report by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions.  The Foundation is a tripartite European Union agency whose role is to provide knowledge to assist in the formulation of better social, employment and work-related policies across EU member states.

The report provided an invaluable insight as to why thousands of people, particularly the working poor, pensioners, people with disabilities and other vulnerable groups are not managing to make ends meet at the end of the month. The European Foundation’s report focused on the statutory minimum wages in EU member states.  Of the 28, 22 EU countries apply a binding statutory minimum wage.  However, the levels of statutory minimum wages vary greatly between the member states.  At €236 monthly, the lowest statutory minimum wage in the EU is that in Bulgaria.

Nonetheless, Malta, together with the Netherlands, Belgium and Greece, has over the past seven years recorded minimum wage decreases in real terms.  Between 1 January 2010 and 1 January 2017, the minimum wages in these countries were not sufficient to cover increases in the cost of living.

While Greece is a particular case and people saw a decrease in wages of 24.3% in real terms, in the Netherlands a decrease of 0.7% in real terms was registered. Persons on the minimum wage in Malta experienced a decrease 1.4%, equivalent to a cut of €2.37 a week.  

The report by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions substantiates what one-fourth of our population face as a daily occurrence.  It is unacceptable and a gross injustice that Government freely squanders more than €13,000 a month on a single salary but then finds it rather difficult to financially assist those in dire need.   

No wonder the crowd which last Sunday attended the political event organised by the PN in Sliema indicated that people are getting hot under the collar.  It was necessary for the PN to signal to one and all that the party is prepared to take the lead in the fight against corruption.  In the face of the ever growing number of alleged cases of corruption and sleaze, Dr Simon Busuttil came across as a promising leader who is prepared to take the necessary measures to curb all forms of corruption.  

For the good of our islands it is imperative that a strong message is sent to government that corruption is not tolerated.  In this regard irrespective of one’s political leanings, it is important that next Sunday a clear sign is transmitted to this administration.  

People must show that they are willing to take all legitimate actions to put an end to corruption and gross social injustices.   When governments are hijacked by the selected few, people are justified to take to the streets to show their disgust.

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