Somebody must have pushed Minister Chris Fearne in front of that bus. Although things have been quite hushed down in a Malta alive with every sort of rumour, the interview with Tim Sebastian on Conflict Zone on Deutsche Welle last week is a must see. (See it on DW’s Facebook page).

We do not need to specify Tim Sebastian’s fame. His Hard Talk interviews are renowned all over the world.

Chris Fearne as the deputy prime minister was the victim. He had to sit through Sebastian’s relentless questioning for half an hour and, truth be said, he did not come out well at all. Nor did his government. Nor did Malta.

Put together, the barbs that Sebastian lobbed at the hapless Fearne show a Malta we hesitate to identify with. A Malta with 28 bomb explosions of which only two have been solved. A Malta selling passports to shady (in the sense they are not identified) persons. A Malta where ministers and high officials identified by the Panama Papers are still under investigation (the minister’s words) but have been kept on. A Malta that sells its hospitals to a company with no track record of managing one.

Fearne does not come out shining from this interrogation. With regards to the last mentioned allegation, he just says he did not sign the agreement with Vitals, as if that matters at the end.

Nor does the government, but we know that, we have known that for months if not years. Sebastian did not come with new allegations. He was relating what has already been told in the media or European Parliament delegations and committees. It is the cumulative impact of all these allegations being strung together that is mind-boggling.

He also brought up what Rosy Bindi, the head of the Italian anti-Mafia commission said, but Fearne chose to counter that as just an allegation made on a paper (this one to be specific).

Sebastian’s main thrust, if we can call it that, is that Malta is a country with a soft sort of justice, where people have all the right to go to court, and to appeal from judgments even if you are the prime minister or a minister, and, as a result, criminals can get away with anything.

It is thus no coincidence that Malta slipped badly in the list of countries and corruption. These things do not happen by accident. Can anyone downplay the impact of this interview on the wide German public and the consequent judgment on Malta as a state where the rule of law is paramount? The minister’s declarations in favour of the rule of law sound very hollow when confronted with Sebastian’s relentless questions.

In these turbulent times, we must keep everything in context as otherwise we will fall prey to the government’s spin machine. We can easily be sidetracked down so many turnings and end up not seeing the trees for the leaves.

The main thing is the overall picture and the one that comes from Tim Sebastian’s interview is a gruesome one.