Full of mercy

Donald J Trump has been busy issuing Presidential pardons to his friends, family, donors and supporters. He’s pardoned his longtime confidant, Roger Stone, his campaign manager, Paul Manafort, and his son-in-law’s father, Charles Kushner.  He’s even pardoned January 6^th rioters who stormed the Capitol and attacked police officers. Nobody has abused the Presidential clemency power quite like Trump.

Trump’s pardons have been blatantly self-interested.   He used his clemency powers to reward loyalty, undermine his political enemies, and even to make money. He’s even claimed that he has “an absolute right to pardon myself”.

Meanwhile, in Malta,  Labour has been busy handing out its own pardons for similar repugnant partisan interests. It’s been making sure that those closest to Labour who were part of its stinking scandals never face justice.  Testimony in open court in those shocking cases would be a massive blow to Labour.  So Labour ensured that those multi-million euro money laundering cases were quietly buried with a quick deal with the tax commissioner.

From the very beginning of Labour’s return to power, the party sought to curry favour with the public by pardoning flagrant criminal action.  When hundreds of people were caught tampering with electricity meters and bribing officials to cut their electricity bills, Labour intervened to obstruct justice.  Instead of allowing the prosecution of those cheats, Labour allowed them to “regularise their position” and avoid criminal proceedings.  Around 1,000 individuals took up Labour’s offer to shield them from justice and spare them the punishment they deserved – and have been grateful to Labour ever since.  So have their families. In one fell swoop, Labour terminated any possibility of delivering justice and sent out a clear message that cheating, stealing and bribing officials was the new norm.

That message was consolidated when Pilatus bank officials named as potential criminal suspects by a magisterial inquiry were given a nolle prosequi – a guarantee that they wouldn’t be prosecuted – by Labour’s AG. Pilatus’ dirty secrets and the bank’s links to Labour’s top brass remained secret.

Robert Abela followed in Joseph Muscat’s footsteps.  Soon after he took office, when members of the public flouted COVID regulations, emulating the Prime Minister himself, Abela proposed waiving fines and refunding those fines already paid.

Since then Abela’s government has been sanctioning illegal developments by the dozen, defying court decisions ensuring that party funders such as Joseph Portelli and Charles Polidano ic-Caqnu not only escape punishment but are allowed to profit from their illegal developments.

More recently, Abela pardoned hundreds of people who had been fraudulently benefitting from disability benefits which they were not entitled to as part of a Labour-orchestrated scheme using falsified medical certificates, enabled by medical boards stacked with party loyalists who closed both eyes to the evident fraud. Tens of millions of euro were stolen in the scheme.  That money was stolen from truly deserving disabled citizens and from the rest of the country. Instead of coming down on those cheats and on the Labour officials who engineered that scheme, Robert Abela decided to pardon them.  A presidential pardon was issued for hundreds of people who’d received hundreds of thousands of euro in severe disability benefits and their prosecution was terminated.

Until today, almost two years later, none of the perpetrators have been convicted.

Silvio Grixti, the former Labour MP, at the centre of the scandal  and a general practitioner continues to practice to this day despite the serious allegations he faces.  He arrogantly refused to submit to the medical council using a ruling delivered by the courts in favour of another MP, Dr Stephen Spiteri who’d been accused of issuing false sick leave certificates. The vast majority of the beneficiaries of that fraudulent scheme hailed from Labour’s strongholds in the South of the country.  They expected Labour to leap to their defence.  They knew Labour wouldn’t let justice take its course if it meant jail for so many of its loyal supporters – especially since the vast majority of them had been allegedly coerced into the scheme by Labour party officials and its MP, Dr Silvio Grixti. And they weren’t disappointed.

Labour knew that if any of those cheats were imprisoned, they would never forgive Labour,

Abela’s mercy didn’t end there.  He’s now extended his compassion and forgiveness to money launderers and tax cheats.

Abela surreptitiously passed a law allowing tax offenders to simply wash away their guilt by reaching a settlement with the tax authorities.  The law also allows for “connected breaches” including money-laundering to be conveniently laundered.  Konrad Mizzi’s notorious friend and associate Aron Mifsud Bonnici and Robert Abela’s close friend and alleged kidnapper Chris Borg have benefitted from Abela’s mercy.  Their out-of-court settlements with the tax authorities simply extinguished their criminal proceedings for massive money laundering. Their freezing orders were revoked.

And just on the eve of the general election Labour promised those with a lifetime hunting license ban that they would get their licence back.  Silvio Schembri promised hunters that Labour would reverse court-imposed penalties for hunting offences. Maybe those hunters were vulnerable too and Labour feels their pain, especially before a general election.

As of June 11th, Donald Trump had granted executive clemency to 1700 individuals out of 342.6 million US citizens.  Those pardoned are forever grateful to the great Donald.

But that’s a drop in the ocean compared to Malta’s Labour.  Approximately 1,000 consumers benefitted from Labour’s amnesty scheme over electricity theft. Robert Abela pardoned hundreds more who falsely claimed disability benefits.  Many more will benefit from his Bill 142 tax settlement amnesty.  And Malta doesn’t have 342.6 million people – it barely has 400,000 Maltese citizens.

Per capita Labour has effectively pardoned a 1,000 times as many people as Trump has. Make Malta great again – at least at showing cynical mercy to crooks and cheats.