The Nationalist Party has rebuked Justice Minister Jonathan Attard's comments that criticized the prosecution's request for a gagging order within the hospitals corruption case.
Attard had called the gag order disproportionate.
The party statement also called for Attard to stop harming the country's justice system.
In a statement released by PN's Justice spokesperson Karol Aquilina, the Nationalist Party labelled Attard's comments as a "condemnable attack" against the concerned magistrate and the prosecutor working in Court against the likes of Joseph Muscat, Konrad Mizzi, Keith Schembri, and others.
The PN said that Minister Attard, through the comments he made on One Radio on Wednesday, has become the country's first Minister for Justice to "publicly and shamelessly" take fire against a prosecutor and a magistrate serving the State.
The Minister's comments came just a day after the magistrate accepted the prosecution's request for a gagging order.
"It is evident that Minister Jonathan Attard is unhappy with those who are being loyal to the people and to the oath they swore," the Nationalist Party stated. "He is trying to interfere and influence to protect those who are being accused of having committed the biggest fraud in the face of the Maltese and Gozitan people."
On behalf of his party, Aquilina said that "this behaviour is unacceptable in a democracy and is totally condemnable." He also reiterated that this court case is referencing "the biggest case of corruption that our country has ever seen."
This statement concluded that Minister Attard has shown once again, "as he has shown on several other occasions," that he is not placing the interest of the State and its institutions first, he said. Aquilina said that Attard "is rendering himself complicit with Joseph Muscat in the attack orchestrated and coordinated by him and Robert Abela on the judiciary and on all those who are working for justice in our country."
In response, Justice Minister Attard said that Aquilina "doesn't need to go far to know who really attacked our country's institutions. He knows who slaughters with his words, and worse with his actions, the Police commissioner, the Attorney General and certain adjudicators. Just this morning Repubblika attacked the decision by two magistrates who did not accept their request."
"With arrogance and a sense of superiority, he pretends that the observations I made with the utmost respect, I don't have a right to make. What I said today is that the request by the prosecution for a number of people to be stopped from expressing themselves was disproportionate. Karol Aquilina pretended that I would not speak. As he believes only he and his friends of the establishment can talk," the Minister for Justice said.