Here is a little conundrum for all those ethical experts out there... you know, that army of moral torchbearers who regularly write in to the papers, telling us what God we should believe in, what clothes we should wear, how we should bring up our children, etc.
Which of the following would you consider the more serious offence? A corruption case involving the issue of boat and/or car licences against bribes of between Lm75 and Lm250? Or an act of negligence, coupled with direct government interference to justify a blatant illegality, which directly results in loss of human life and limb, not to mention extensive damage to private property... all followed by concealment of the evidence when the excrement hits the fan?
Personally, I would have thought the latter. But then, Iím obviously living on another planet.
For while the Jesmond Mugliett saga had everybody and his dog writing in to the papers (mainly to defend poor Jesmond, who is of course Nationalist and therefore chosen by God), hardly anyone appears to have noticed the emergence of a truly horrific scandal in the past few weeks.
OK, letís begin with the part everybody already knows. Recently, The Times and Illum separately revealed how the St Helenís Fireworks Factory which blew up last month, killing five people and causing extensive damage to nearby residences, had been sanctioned to operate by a Cabinet decision in 2001 ñ a decision taken without any consultation with the Explosives Committee, despite the glaring fact that the same factory was less than one third the legal minimum distance from the surrounding inhabited areas.
(Note: I need hardly remind you all that the Santa Liena festa in Birkirkara, for which the manufactured fireworks are eventually destined, takes place a petardís throw from then-Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adamiís home, in what is arguably the most impregnable Nationalist bastion in the entire country.)
Anyway: according to these reports, the Ombudsman of the day had received a number of complaints that two fireworks factories in the vicinity of Gharghur were sited only 50 metres from the nearest houses, when the minimum distance required by law is 183 metres.
Faced with this dilemma, government hit upon a truly innovative solution. Far from shutting down those infernal (and illegal) death-traps once and for all, it did the very opposite. It intervened directly, and with no apparent justification, to ìregulariseî the state of illegality in which those factories were operating. It then went on to studiously ignore all subsequent warnings about safety standards, until... BANG! The inevitable (and umpteenth) tragedy occurred.
Of course, the government will no doubt present the case differently. It will probably point out the same old, tired argument that at no point did it do anything which was actually illegal. And indeed it did not. After all, it is difficult to stand accused of breaking the law, when you are sitting at the head of a Cabinet of Ministers which can change the law at the drop of the hat by simply issuing a legal notice (thus bypassing parliament, and effectively sidestepping the need to discuss issues in any public venue). This is precisely the kind of legalistic gymnastics we have come to expect from a government composed primarily of lawyers. And to be honest, it doesnít get much more insidious than this.
Effectively, Cabinet reclassified the road leading from Naxxar to Taí L-Ibragg (and on which the nearby residences were, and still are, situated) so that it no longer fell within the definition of a ìregularly usedî road, as stipulated in that tricky little bit about safety and fireworks factories. This way, the two factories concerned ñ one of which, by the way, had already blown up in 2000 ñ could carry on their lethal business as usual, despite the fact that the standards of safety had not in any way improved.
In other words, the law was changed to accommodate the fireworks factory, and not the other way around. Can anyone still claim to be surprised, then, at the five utterly avoidable fatalities we all witnessed on 27 June, 2007?
If, like me, the above story makes you sick to your stomach, well, sit back and pour yourself a stiff drink, because itís about to get a whole lot worse.
It now transpires that way back in 2004, Home Affairs Minister Tonio Borg was presented with a report, drawn up by the newly established Pyrotechnicsí Commission, specifically on the subject of safety (or the lack thereof) in Maltaís fireworks factories.
The Commission is composed of Joseph Theuma (an expert in pyrotechnics), Anthony Farrugia representing the Pyrotechnics Federation, and Civil Protection director Peter Cordina, among others. It is appointed by and answerable to the Home Affairs Ministry, which is in turn responsible for the police (who licence fireworks factories to begin with), the CPD (which picks up the pieces whenever a licensed factory explodes), and fireworks safety in general.
At this point I have to add that neither I nor anyone else in local journalism has actually seen this document, which is as jealously guarded a State secret as Nixonís Watergate recordings in 1973. But fortunately for the rest of us, there were other people privy to that report. I am told by a little dicky-bird that it highlighted the vicinity of certain factories to built-up areas (but thatís OK, because the government had already ìsolvedî this issue in 2001), and also the lack of any serious safety procedures in a number of factories... including St Helenís in Gharghur.
And while it may have stopped short of recommending the closure of these factories, the report did allegedly suggest a thorough overhaul of work practices: for instance, by reducing the amount of explosives stored in these factories at any one time.
My winged informant also tells me the same report warned of serious consequences if these and other issues were not addressed... although naturally, if I am mistaken in any of these details (and letís face it: would you believe a talking dicky-bird?), the government can always prove me wrong by simply publishing the report, as it should have done three years ago anyway.
And so: presented with expert opinion that human life was in clear and present danger, what did our self avowed ìpro-lifeî Government actually do about it? Apart, that is, from keeping the expertsí report secret, and then refusing to even acknowledge any questions about its contents?
The answer, in a word, is... nothing. Thatís right, folks. In the manner we have come to associate with the Home Affairs Ministry, Dr Tonio Borg took no action whatsoever, despite being (allegedly) urged to do so by the Commission he himself had appointed for that very purpose. As a result, the St Helenís fireworks factory was permitted to operate in the same hazardous conditions for another three years. In fact, it would still be operational today, if it hadnít blown itself to smithereens on 27 June, taking five amateur pyrotechnics enthusiasts with it in the process.
In a sense, Tonio Borg is quite right to keep this pyrotechnics report under lock and key. In any civilised country, if it could be established that a minister disregarded expertsí recommendations which might have prevented a fatal accident, and then went on to keep the whole thing hidden even after the fatalities occurred, that minister would lose his job faster than you could say ìFesta Familja Mimlija Divertiment Ghal Kulhaddî.
But this is Malta, and you can rest assured that Minister Tonio Borg will not lose his job over the St Helenís fireworks factory scandal. After all, we are talking about Godís chosen government here. So not only will Tonio Borg be retained in full regalia, but the usual retinue of Christian moralists will no doubt write in to the papers to defend him, arguing that the whole thing is just a strategy devised by Labour to win the next election... and in any case, those five unfortunate victims of government negligence are now enjoying eternal bliss in Heaven, so what on earth is there to complain about?
Subject of which: on Monday my eyes nearly popped out of my head while reading the following extract, lifted from an article in The Times by Siggiewi mayor Robert Musumeci. ìIf the government opted to exercise its influence in an attempt to conceal matters, in the knowledge that any allegation of corruption would be seriously damaging in the months leading to an election, then the government should have resigned en masse.î
Well, what can I say? Nice to see that at least one PN candidate shares my view that this government should ìresign en masseî over the fireworks scandal... even if he was talking about another scandal altogether.