Abela’s blacklist: loyalty over merit in EU judge selections

Robert Abela made it crystal clear he won’t accept lawyer Jacques Rene Zammit, who specialises in EU law, as Malta’s nominee for EU court judge, despite the second embarrassing failure of those he thought fit for the post.

“Now our country will select a new candidate.  But certainly I will never accept that somebody who systematically harmed, not only our country, but my colleagues, will be proposed for this position. I am being clear about this,” he said.

There you have it from the horse’s mouth.  Abela decides who is selected as an EU court judge.  And that’s exactly why we keep getting humiliated.

Malta has now had two candidates rejected—Edward Zammit Lewis and Veronique Dalli. That’s no surprise because Abela keeps choosing candidates based on blind partisanship and personal interests, not merit or competence.

Abela bears responsibility for humiliating our country not once but twice. Worse, he’s revealed that the so-called “open call,” meant to be a fair, transparent process, is nothing of the sort. It’s entirely rigged.

The whole pretence of an open call and a selection board is just a charade.  Ultimately, as Abela told journalists, he vetoes applicants he dislikes: “At the end of the day, the choice is ours and we will not take part in that dirty game.”

He targeted one such applicant and shamelessly eviscerated him in public, accusing him of damaging Malta. Abela invited journalists to “go and see what he published.” Robert Abela never forgets and never forgives anybody who dared criticise him.

Malta is a small country.  The pool of people suited to be EU court judges is extremely restricted.  The last thing we need is a Prime Minister who personally excludes competent applicants, attacks them publicly, vilifies them openly and accuses them of bad intentions and of being ‘Enemies of the State’.

It’s severely damaging for the country when the Prime Minister picks from a handful of his friends, former MPs or first-degree relatives of sitting ministers. Malta cannot afford to select candidates based on Abela’s whims.

Abela told the press that “there were no concerns about the integrity of Dr Zammit Lewis”. That’s ludicrous. There were huge concerns about Zammit Lewis’ integrity.  A justice minister cosying up to Yorgen Fenech, begging him to take him on holiday, pleading for a dinner invitation, asking him for jobs when he knew he owned an offshore company, 17 Black, is hardly a mark of “total integrity”.  A former Minister at the beck and call of the business mogul is hardly the ideal candidate for an EU court judge.

A brown-noser to a dodgy multi-millionaire with a secret offshore company implicated in money laundering and corruption shouldn’t be Malta’s selected candidate. Zammit Lewis isn’t fit to rule at a small claims tribunal, let alone at the EU court.

A minister who grovelled to Yorgen Fenech, telling him: “I love you, I miss you, I am always there for you”, shouldn’t be judging anything. Proper judgment is the key part of being a judge, and Zammit Lewis’ judgment stinks.

Like anything else Abela touches, he’s made a complete hash of it. When challenged by the press about Veronique Dalli’s rejection, the Prime Minister started off calmly, insisting, “There was a call for those interested in occupying the post of Judge, it was an open call”.  He tried to convince the nation that this was a fair process.

Then, he suddenly lost it. “Just to show you this is a call open for all,” Abela told the press, “a certain person who forms part of the structure (of the EU court) came out declaring that he had the sentence (on the golden passport scheme) in his possession and made subtle digs at the government”.

That “certain person” was Jacques Rene Zammit, who dared to make “subtle digs” at Abela as an author. And Abela is making sure Zammit pays the price.

Abela decided Zammit doesn’t have the credentials for the post – credentials Abela set himself, and for him, “making comments against your country (that is, the Labour Party)” automatically excludes you.  Voicing criticism of Abela, no matter how mild, constitutes being “against your country”. Anybody who doesn’t bend the knee to the great leader is immediately disqualified.

That’s just pure vindictiveness. It’s a rampant abuse of power. If the selection process were truly open and independent, Abela would have no say in it. Instead, Abela revealed that he had made the decision: “I will never accept” such individuals, he said.

He even prejudged the outcome of any future selection process.  Worse still, he publicly targeted a private individual who put his name forward to serve the country, attacking, intimidating and threatening him. That will deter anybody interested in the post who isn’t deep red Labour from applying.

Veronique Dalli was rejected not because the PN harms the country or because Jacques Rene Zammit penned articles critical of Abela’s government. She was rejected because she didn’t make the grade.

Labour’s Ramona Frendo went through her grilling and passed, serving the EU court, and has now been promoted to the European Court of Justice. She wasn’t rejected. Abela’s malicious insinuations against the ECJ’s Committee 255 are deplorable.  He’s impugning the integrity of the panel of judges who sit on that committee by implying they let the PN and the other ‘Enemies of the State’ influence their judgment. Abela always seeks a scapegoat for his own failures.

Only a truly fair, rigorous selection process will yield the right candidate.  In his frantic attempt to portray the selection process as fair, Abela revealed it’s rigged. He’s the one calling the shots. It’s not Jacques Rene Zammit who causes real damage to the country; it’s Robert Abela.