Opinion: Commissioner gives PM carte blanche to breach ethics with impunity

The Standards Commissioner just ruled that Robert Abela is abusing the law. According to Commissioner Joseph Azzopardi, the prime minister is abusing Article 13(4) of the Standards in Public Life Act to exonerate himself from being found guilty of breaching ethics.

On 2 July, the Department of Information (DOI) issued a statement regarding Steward Health Care’s attempt to destroy Chris Fearne by disseminating fake stories using taxpayers’ money meant for our hospitals. The DOI stated that the Cabinet had taken note of the allegations and supported the prime minister in declaring that those allegations should be investigated.

Despite the Commissioner’s previous warnings, Robert Abela’s DOI statement descended into the most obscene partisan accusations.  “The Opposition was always ready to destroy the former deputy prime minister… the Opposition was never interested in Malta’s position but only in taking immediate partisan political advantage.” according to the DOI statement.

But nobody knows. The Commissioner’s report to Complaint 179, which requested the Commissioner investigate Abela’s partisan DOI statement,  wasn’t published.  It’s top secret.

That secrecy serves only one purpose – to protect Abela. Commissioner Azzopardi ensured that nobody discovered Abela’s wrongdoing, ethics breaches and petulant partisan abuse.

The Standards Commissioner wriggled out of investigating Abela by bizarrely claiming it wasn’t just the prime minister who breached ethics – it was the whole Cabinet.

Instead of finding the whole cabinet in breach, Abela’s subservient commissioner decided he shouldn’t investigate.

His excuse was that he could not scrutinise the Cabinet. So he let Abela and his cabinet off the hook. And since he decided not to investigate, he’s not obliged to publish his report.

The Commissioner knew Abela was in the wrong.  He knew Abela breached ethics with the rest of the Cabinet. Azzopardi declared the content of Abela’s DOI statement  “was partisan” in his report.

The Commissioner wrote: “The fact that in this case no action can be taken against behaviour that represents a breach of ethics is preoccupying.  This can be considered abuse of Article 13(4) of the Act of Standards in Public Life”.

The entire Cabinet hijacked the DOI in the most obscenely partisan way to accuse the Opposition of being interested only in partisan political point-scoring.  The party that tried to destroy Chris Fearne wasn’t the PN – it was Labour.

When those despicable lies about Fearne first surfaced, the Labour Party didn’t even issue a statement defending its deputy leader.  When reporters questioned Abela, he didn’t leap to Fearne’s defence.  He said the institutions should be allowed to work and carry out their investigations.

It will soon be three months since Abela issued that DOI statement stating that the hit job on Fearne “should be investigated”.  Nobody’s been charged.

Steward Health Care CEO Ralph de la Torre and his counterpart in Malta Armin Ernst, who investigative journalists identified as the people who paid a British intelligence company to dig up dirt on Fearne, should have been charged over the Vitals/Steward fraud months ago.

What is the Attorney General waiting for? Why has nobody been held accountable for the false stories about Fearne?

Abela was quite happy seeing his leadership rival politically eliminated. He’s delighted Fearne has been forced out of Cabinet, the deputy prime minister role and now even the deputy party leader position.

Abela’s offensive attack on the Opposition in that DOI statement was only intended to deflect attention from Labour’s collusion in the country’s biggest-ever fraud.

Despite the previous warnings by the Standards Commissioner that DOI statements should be “as factual, non-partisan and authoritative as possible”, Abela couldn’t contain himself.

The Commissioner already found Silvio Schembri and Miriam Dalli in breach for their partisan statements. He warned that he would “take a more serious view of similar future cases.”

But when Abela lost his rag and used the DOI to indulge in offensive partisan name-calling, the Commissioner chickened out.  His tough talk evaporated when faced with the prime minister’s rude reply on 8 July.

Abela did not even bother to deny the DOI statement was partisan. He came up with a ridiculous excuse.  “The subject matter of the complaint relates to deliberations by the Ministerial Cabinet and therefore falls under Article 20 of the Standards in Public Life Act… Therefore, this complaint does not merit any ulterior investigation”.

Article 20 has nothing to do with DOI statements. It is intended to prevent secret Cabinet decisions and information from being inadvertently divulged as a result of the Commissioner’s investigations.

There was nothing secret about the DOI statement – it was public. Even if there were secret information, that shouldn’t stop the Commissioner investigating.

The Commissioner clearly pointed that out to Abela: “Article 20 of the Act should not stop an investigation as the prime minister appears to expect.”

You’d think that, having invalidated Abela’s demand to stop the investigation, the Commissioner would have proceeded.

Instead, Commissioner Azzopardi dug up his own excuse for not investigating.  He quoted Article 13(4) of the same Act, which states that the Commissioner “should not prejudice the powers and prerogatives of the prime minister over Cabinet”.

He quoted the previous Commissioner, who stated that “the aim of the Standards Act is to scrutinise the behaviour of a minister or particular person and not the decision of Cabinet”.

In one fell swoop, Commissioner Azzopardi gave Cabinet carte blanche to breach ethics with impunity.

He has given Abela authorisation to continue to weaponise the DOI against the Opposition. All he has to do is claim it was a Cabinet decision.

Abela is unable to rise above the squalid partisan baiting.  He lacks the gravitas and seriousness of a prime minister.

He believes it’s his right to transform state organs like the DOI into his mouthpiece. He thinks it’s his prerogative to insult the nation with his childish name-calling.

Abela turned TVM into ONE News 2, and now he’s on course to turn the DOI into ONE News 3. The sad thing is that he’s got the Standard Commissioner’s blessing to do just that – abuse the law.