The past week has not been easy on the prime minister, especially after the 17 Black revelations became public.

Any other person in his position would have been up to his neck trying to cope with this old and new allegation that continued to undermine Malta’s international reputation.

But when he faced his supporters at the Msida PL club on Sunday, Prime Minister Muscat appeared as anything except flustered. Actually, he was as cool as ever.

As reported in the media, Muscat downplayed the most recent allegation. Last week’s 17 Black revelation was the latest version of events in a long stream of allegations, he said on Sunday.

Muscat said the report that the once secret offshore company belonged to a private businessman had been preceded by claims that it belonged to former minister John Dalli, members of the current administration, and even he himself.

He reiterated that he would await the conclusions of a magisterial inquiry into the matter, and said that not so long ago his political rivals had claimed that his wife Michelle had owned the offshore company Egrant.

“Things have been said in the past, and they turned out not to be true. I will await the conclusion of proper inquiries and take action on the basis of those inquiries,” he said.

He even tried to turn the charges against the Opposition. Muscat mocked Opposition figures who used their European position to criticise his administration “and Malta” while ignoring its achievements. “If the opposition believes that once there is an allegation, resignations should be tendered, MEP David Casa should resign today. Even Opposition leader Adrian Delia should resign since he was accused of laundering money from criminal businesses.” 

Such ringing declarations may well have satisfied the party faithful in front of him and also the bulk of the population sitting in front of their television sets for the evening news on a Sunday evening. But it does not bear close scrutiny by those who are not satisfied by spin.

But people are not gullible, or at least not all people are that gullible. One has only to skim through the many comments posted on news portals to see that for many this cool approach by the Prime Minister nor the posturing by his ministers wriggling whenever they find themselves under fire or questions by the media, cut any ice.

Sooner or later, hopefully sooner rather than later, Muscat must face up to his responsibilities and/or his inaction in the face of clear enough evidence and he will have to do that not facing party faithful in his party’s club, nor facing Parliament when he can easily and glibly avoid any real answer by means of his dialectical skills.

There will be a time, and hopefully it will be sooner rather than later, when the powers of the European Union shake themselves awake and insist on getting clear answers to clear questions. Even then, enough damage will have been done to Malta’s reputation.

To turn everything into an electoral contest, when the latest poll gives him an almost unassailable advantage, is both unfair and does not do the proper job of ensuring justice. Otherwise criminals and murderers would flock to get elected so that they get to benefit from immunity.

There was a time when that was the custom, when an emperor would get himself elected so as to benefit from immunity, but we hope we are not going to go back to those days.