'Ġaħan fl-aqwa żmien'

Author: Mark Camilleri

Publisher: Dar Camilleri / 2022

Pages: 191

The author is today known for other reasons, most notably for a website that around five times a day comes up with news or comment on the Maltese state of affairs.

These items are of different length and rather different consistency. Usually critical, sometimes quite harsh, of the Robert Abela administration but also critical of the Nationalist Opposition.

It is probably most known for revealing the content of messages between Rosianne Cutajar and Jorgen Fenech.

Before that, Mark Camilleri was the head of the National Book Council before he was replaced by another Mark Camilleri.

There are other aspects of the original Mark Camilleri including the setting up, single-handedly, of a publishing house.

He may also be known as the Scarlet Pimpernel of the Maltese political scene since he has been forced to live abroad in clandestinity because, he says, of threats against his life.

It is not known at what stage in his variegated life he got to write this slim satirical book but the theme fits in with his critical view of Malta under Labour.

The way he describes it, Malta is as ugly as Fgura - developed from a road linking Paola to Zabbar, which developed into a variety of shops with no parking provided, shops created by turning the front room into a shop.

And then there's also the problem of density of population and also, till some years ago, getting the black dust from the nearby dockyard.

Nevertheless the population is mostly left-wing and adored Dom Mintoff.

Then, in 1987, Labour was kicked out and the Nationalist government came in, which was when Dustin, the anti-hero of the book, was born.

He made it to that Nationalist-created MCAST and chose IT, the PN's gift to Malta.

But, in the terms made famous by a former Labour minister, he is and remains a Gahan, a Maltese byword for an ignorant backward goof.

He is a fat, lazy, slob who eats masses of unhealthy food. At the same time, he is still a virgin.

All this changes when on one of his rare outings to Paceville, he is pounced upon by Polly, who has ambitions to be a mayor and wants Dustin to set up a novel interactive website for her to create a new version of participatory democracy.

Needless to say, the outcome is pure farce.