Former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat does not feel that his efforts to get the magistrate leading the Vitals inquiry to recuse herself conflict with his previous assertions that he has full faith in the country’s institutions.

Muscat was asked outside of court by The Malta Independent whether there was a conflict in how he had always insisted that he had full faith in the country’s institutions but at the same time was now demanding that a magistrate be recused from leading an inquiry.

“Not at all,” he replied.

“Firstly, the institution is not any one person, but it is the institution itself,” he continued.

Muscat said that he “did not attack the person but came to get an institutional remedy for what I am saying, which is in and of itself respect for the institutions.”

Muscat denied “attacking” the judiciary, saying that he was merely seeing that the “rule of law is safeguarded.”

Muscat testified in court on Thursday as he continued to seek the recusal of the magistrate who is leading the inquiry into the controversial deal to sell three public hospitals to Vitals Global Healthcare.

Muscat had filed a request in the Constitutional Court in order for Magistrate Gabriella Vella to be removed from leading the magisterial inquiry, stating that he had lost faith in her impartiality.

Muscat had already asked for the magistrate to recuse herself, saying that the fact that two of her family members had posted on social media supporting the cause of the NGO Repubblika – which had requested the inquiry into the hospitals deal – impinged on her impartiality.

Magistrate Vella however had refused the recusal request, prompting Muscat to file constitutional proceedings, which began on Thursday.