Several letters have been appearing in the local press from persons who in past years suffered injustices. Whoever is writing has every reason to do so because in a democratic country like Malta, such matters should have been put in order a long time ago. Several Parliamentary Questions have been put from members of both sides of the House. Time passed and many persons who suffered injustices are still with the written recommendation in their hands.
More than a year and four months ago, a Select Committee of the House with members from the government and Opposition sides was set up with an agenda to strengthen democracy in Malta. This committee was expected to see that pending cases of injustices are solved and should have submitted a report about unsolved cases by the end of October 2008.
To date, fifteen months later, nobody has heard anything from them. Both Labourites and Nationalists were hit by all sorts of injustices. When will pending recommendations pronounced against the government by the Injustices Commission, tribunals and the Office of the Ombudsman, be effected and the injustices suffered honoured?
Lately, just before the Christmas and New Year’s Parliamentary recess, in P.Q. No. 13589 the Prime Minister replied that there have been some developments. For another parliamentary question about the same subject made to the deputy Prime Minister after Christmas, the answer was that pending cases regarding injustices were not discussed by a select committee but somewhere else.
Time has now come when whoever suffered an injustice, be they red, blue or green should have received compensation. Every Maltese/European citizen is conscious that he is not living in a banana republic where stability, freedom and democracy never prevail.
Have the Maltese people a right to know what are the developments hinted at in the reply to PQs 13589 and 13900?
Who from among the members of the House will have the courage to ask the government to indicate at what stage the talks on the implementation of recommendations regarding injustices has arrived?
Although those citizens who were left with the recommendations in their hands are a minority group, I think they still have a right to receive what is due to them.
Will the opposition consider tabling a motion in Parliament to discuss this matter of outstanding recommendations as it did in case of other important matters in the name of democracy?
I would argue that now is the time when empty words and phrases should be done away with, and the opposition should make utmost pressure on the government to give everyone his due. If on the other the side government is not prepared and pleased to come to terms, then the opposition should stop cooperating with the government on any legislation, the exceptions being only those cases of national importance.
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