Jason Micallef has decided that a banner stuck to a balcony in Valletta is vandalism that should never be permitted in a UNESCO world heritage site.

The outspoken Micallef, who is the head of the Valletta Cultural Agency amongst other things, took offence to a banner which appeared on a walkway which overlooks the entrance to Valletta and the Parliament building.

The banner reads ‘Justice for Daphne’ and was affixed in the aftermath of businessman Yorgen Fenech being acquitted of all charges in connection with her murder. 

It joins two more banners which are already affixed to the same place: one seeking justice for Jean Paul Sofia, the young man killed in a construction collapse in December 2022, and another seeking justice for Eleanor Walker who was murdered 10 years ago and whose case is still pending trial.

Micallef chastised authorities for being afraid of criticism from “extremist organisations and their acolytes in the supposedly independent media”, saying that this is an enormous sign of weakness.

“It is your job to stop this bare-faced abuse that has gone on for whole month and years, even if these organisations are doing it on purpose to goad,” he wrote on Facebook.

It is quite surreal that a government CEO seems to think that people seeking justice for a journalist murdered in a car bombing, that people seeking justice for a 20-year-old killed in a construction collapse, and that people seeking justice for a woman allegedly beaten to death by her husband are “extremists.”

Sofia’s mother, Isabelle Bonnici, herself responded to Micallef’s statement: “I want to make my voice heard, and I am not doing anything against the law. We are a democracy and we have freedom of expression. I’m not hurting anyone by doing this,” she said.

Indeed, this is the right to protest – a sacrosanct right in any civilised democracy – manifested.  The messages are clear and they are overlooking the country’s highest institution. 

They are reminding Members of Parliament every time they enter and exit Parliament that all is not well, that justice is yet to be served, and that it is their responsibility to ensure that justice is served and that things change so they are not repeated.

Perhaps Micallef will take umbrage at this point; perhaps he will accuse this newspaper of being one of the so-called acolytes that he believes exist in the mediasphere.  Good luck to him, if that makes him sleep better at night.

It does not change the fact, though, that severe injustice continues to exist all across this country and that people like him seem more intent at getting worked up at banners or at candles at the foot of a monument than at actually addressing those injustices. 

It is an extreme type of insecurity to be so angered by a banner or some candles, and yet at the same time seemingly not be angry about the daily injustices that normal people face every single day.

But perhaps it is comfortable – even convenient – for these injustices to be ignored.  That’s what they want people to believe.  That these things are a flash in the pan, that they’ve happened and long past, that they’re closed chapters.

But they are not closed chapters: far from it, and it is only the right political will that will ensure that injustices of any kind are not repeated over and over again.  The fact with political will is that sometimes the horse needs to be taken the water and reminded exactly how to drink for it to happen as it should.

Banners outside Parliament are precisely that; a daily reminder of some the injustices that need to be addressed: the impact of court delays in the case of Eleanor Walker, the wanton cowboy nature of the construction industry in the case of Jean Paul Sofia, and the protection of journalists in the case of Daphne Caruana Galizia.

So may our representatives continue to be reminded of these calls for justice.  Only by heeding them will the country move forward for the better.

And as a post-script, if Micallef would like to cite Valletta’s UNESCO World Heritage site, he may want to refer himself to far greater issues in that regards – issues such as UNESCO’s own warning that planning policies do not sufficiently safeguard Valletta and its world heritage status.

That feels like it may be a far greater issue than three banners.