The conclusions and recommendations of the board of inquiry on the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia are being undermined, as the Government pays lip service while deflecting its responsibility to address their implications, Moviment Graffitti said on Tuesday.

In a statement, the NGO reminded that the inquiry found “abundant evidence of the deep, intimate, and inappropriate ties between the highest levels of public administration and big business.”

These ties led to the grave actions committed by elements of the State, centrally orchestrated from the Office of the Prime Minister, to shackle and silence Daphne Caruana Galizia because her journalism was a threat to the powerful financial interests arising from the incestuous marriage between politics and business, they added.

Perhaps most pertinent at this point in time is the Ministry for Justice’s responsibility to guarantee rule of law by ensuring that the long arm of justice reaches all those who break the law, whoever they are, whatever their political and economic power, they said.

The board of inquiry concluded that the manifest reality revealed throughout the proceedings is that, for the State, the interests of private business take precedence over the public good.

“Yet the Minister for Justice whose remit it is to ensure that this culture of impunity is eradicated has been shown to have the closest of ties with the businessman accused of being at the very centre of this nexus of political-economic interests, to the point of being the alleged mastermind of the assassination”, they continued.

The same Minister for Justice claims to have a firm conviction that he has always acted with integrity, despite the board of inquiry’s conclusion that no member of that Parliamentary Group acted with integrity in choosing to defend the indefensible actions of Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri, the statement reads.

“It is inconceivable that a State found to have facilitated an assassination through the many and widespread instances of dereliction of responsibility that led to private interests being given a higher priority than the public good can hope to fix the situation through a Minister whose deep, intimate, and inappropriate relationship to those same private interests is documented, public, and pathetic.”

They called Zammit Lewis’ “firm conviction” of his own integrity “irrelevant” and said that they have seen enough assurances, beliefs, and convictions unravelling under the weight of evidence to the contrary over the last years.

“If we continue to trust evidently compromised individuals' reassurances of their own integrity, we will all be a Ġaħan”, they said – quoting Zammit Lewis’ description of the average Labour voter in a chat with Yorgen Fenech.

Moviment Graffitti pointed out the then-Minister for Tourism’s promise in Parliament that no high-rise will be built in the North Harbour Area until a master plan is concluded – which promise lies in the dust of other big business interests’ monuments to impunity – a reference to plans which ultimately allowed high-rises to be built by Fenech’s Tumas Group in Mriehel.

This is no time for business as usual, and the extensive conclusions and recommendations laid out by the board of inquiry need to be acted on with due urgency and dedication, they said.

“There are many structural improvements to be made, but Yorgen Fenech’s bosom buddy should not be the one making them”, they concluded.