It is true we are at the height of summer, so expect some silly comments and reasonable amount of thrash in the media. With earthquakes in Japan, Russian diplomats forced to leave London, more suicide bombs in Iraq and Osama Bin Laden eating candyfloss in Piccadilly Circus, one should not be too surprised if Malta’s leading daily newspaper has focused all its attention on… the certification of the latest Harry Potter movie.
Yes, you’ve read right. Harry Potter, not Jesmond Mugliett and not Carmel Cacopardo.
You see, Harry Potter has been classified as being suitable for children aged 12 in Malta and guess what, all the mums are up in arms!
Thankfully I have not read any Harry Potter books, not a fan of the writer who delights in bastardising English words in the way that Mugliett would have become a Mugliettwit, Censu a Censupuss, and Sammut a Sammutphob.
But what I do know is that Harry Potter films (and yes, I have seen one or two) are surely more suitable for adults trying to escape the real world. If children need this kind of fantasy to develop their senses, can you imagine what they will be watching in 20 years’ time. Exorcist Reloaded perhaps?
But surely, to have the Times of Malta dedicate its whole editorial on why the board of censors chose to give an age-12 rating to the latest installation of Harry Potter is diabolical if not downright farcical.
The day before, the same newspaper dedicated a piece on the need for an early election. The editorial sent shivers down everybody’s spine at Stamperija. With its mollifying essay on Harry Potter yesterday, it lightened up everybody’s mood – they were probably all laughing.
Just a day after a call for an early election, it was all about Muggles and mail-owls. I guess this is what happens when different and disconnected people are asked to write editorials.
If there is one man who should be at the centre of any editorial (and covered in The Times) it has got to be Carmel Cacopardo.
Joe Falzon, the MEPA auditor, has insisted that Cacopardo is his man. MEPA on the other hand think that Cacopardo is definitely not their man.
And in the fracas, MEPA has reacted by asking Mr Justice Joseph Said Pullicino to intervene as the supreme Ombudsman.
In their letter to Environment Minister George Pullicino, Andrew Calleja has explained Cacopardo’s interest in the post of investigating officer as untenable because: 1. he chaired an AD meeting; 2. he applied for a post in MEPA, which he would be asked to audit/investigate; 3. he wrote an article in The Times over MEPA reform.
I could have told Andrew Calleja that if he had stuck to point number 2 he would have been very justified in questioning Cacopardo’s reappointment. He could also have added that Carmel Cacopardo is a pain. But reference to number 1 and number 3 are very, very out of line.
Carmel Cacopardo is not an easy person, granted, but his life history reads like something out of the 1980s textbook of how a prototype Nationalist was vilified and discriminated. He was an unsung PN hero. Cacopardo’s own determination and stubbornness contributed in no small way in oiling the Nationalist campaign against the Labour government of the day. At the time, it is very probable that Andrew Calleja was fishing for mullet at Msida creek while the rest of the gladiators were making it a point to get beaten up by Labour thugs.
Worse still, Cacopardo was kicked out of his job by Labour minister Lorry Sant for writing in In-Nazzjon and winning a Constitutional case, when he was a Nationalist candidate there was no problem at all with Carmel Cacopardo: he was perfectly fit for government.
And if chairing a political discussion is tantamount to incompatibility, what should we say to the droves of Nationalist appointees who hold office with no relevant experience and capability, and who have no qualms living with their own conflicts of interest and being actively involved with political parties?
MEPA’s obsession with Alternattiva Demokratika has now reached new highs. That is all the Greens need: attention.
With the same kind of reasoning, all MEPA board members should resign, with the exception of Labour MP Joe Brincat, because none of the members are remotely Labourite or green in their political leanings, but downright Nationalist.
What is even more worrying is the fact that you don’t vilify a former political diehard “just like that.” But I guess what is happening to Cacopardo is what always happens in politics: everything boomerangs back and nothing is sacred.
In 1987, I served under Carmel Cacopardo when he was acting head of environment, having replaced Vince Farrugia who had been the head of IDEA under Labour minister Daniel Micallef. Cacopardo was then a PN candidate who fared rather miserably in the elections.
One of his first moves was to transfer the very efficient girls in the secretariat, simply because they had Labourite roots. There are other stories I could recount. I will stop here for now.
But I should end by noting that one of Cacopardo’s underlings apart from myself was a young architect. His name was George Pullicino.

If Carmel Cacopardo is fast becoming a nuisance to the establishment, then so is Astrid Vella.
Am anonymous note arrived on my desk, pointing out that Ms Vella, as the leader of the Front Ghal Ambjent Ahjar, had an enforcement order issued on her Gozo summer residence.
The infringement at her second home in Xewkija, which was supposed to have some alterations and a pool, are related to small misdemeanours which according to Ms Vella, her architect forgot to include in the plans. They include a window and another keyhole window, over a traditionally reconstructed balcony.
But Ms Vella should be aware that the Nationalist tactic is to drown the opposition. The least she could do is not give the enemy enough evidence to send her galloping to the gallows.
Protesting in the streets of Valletta about the need for a pristine environment and allowing your architect to make such a mistake is not exactly opportune. Ms Vella you are now a public person, so do be careful.

In the good old days when I let my blonde hair sprout out like an overgrown vegetable garden, I donned a silly Palestinian shawl and protested in hope that everyone would hug a tree rather than a cheque book. I was such a purist, people thought I was nutty. I made it a point to live life as I preached it and I recall struggling to live up to a manifesto for the environment in 1983 drawn up with the likes of today’s Broadcasting Authority chief executive Kevin Aquilina and others.
The manifesto talked about banning swimming pools, instituting a public transport system that would render private cars unnecessary and other proposals that I am too shy to publicise. Times change, and one changes but certain other things do not.
Like all good lefties, I have dug deep into my own bourgeois ways. I learned all about Chateau Latour and oysters and today I yearn for a swimming pool, a Maserati and a villa over Ramla l-Hamra.
Then suddenly I am shaken back to ground zero and realise how much better it is to dig into a curry, dive into the real thing, the Mediterranean Sea, to drive my Opel and to walk around Ramla l-Hamra without really having to say that I own a house, a villa or an apartment there.

sbalzan@mediatoday.com.mt