A protest is being planned for Monday calling for the resignation of Speaker Anglu Farrugia.

In a statement, Repubblika, Occupy Justice and manueldelia.com said that they agree with Matthew Caruana Galizia's request for the resignation of the Speaker, and agree with former Prime Minister Lawrence gonzi's statement, that "we cannot continue like this."

On Sunday, the son of Daphne Caruana Galizia wrote to Farrugia calling for his resignation for failing to reprimand Labour MP Rosianne Cutajar. He took the Speaker to task over the fact that he had simply asked the Clerk to send a letter to Cutajar to inform her that the standards committee had decided to reprimand her, meaning that the former PS was not actually reprimanded, let alone sanctioned. The issue revolves around a decision by the Standards Committee to adopt a report which had found Cutajar in breach of ethics over her role in a failed property deal involving Yorgen Fenech.

The Speaker then sent Caruana Galizia a legal letter penned by Professor Ian Refalo. The lawyer said the Speaker was rebutting the "unfounded" allegations, and invited Caruana Galizia to brush up on the law, saying that he should not have written directly to the Speaker.

Former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi has harshly criticised Speaker Anglu Farrugia for the way the latter treated Matthew Caruana Galizia, who called for Farrugia's resignation.

In their statement, the NGOs said that "it is shameful that even an institution that is meant to represent honest citizens was taken over and is, instead "defending corrupt politicians."

"It is shameful that we have a Speaker who, with one hands defends MPs found guilty by the Standards Commissioner and the Standards Committee and on the other gets a lawyer to try and intimidate and silence a citizen."

"It is even more shameful when the citizen is the son of a journalist who was assassinated," the NGOs said.