Democracy in Malta according to the Bourgeoisie

The remains of Galizia's car after the explosion.

At present in Malta the Bourgeoisie Class and its allies some of the better paid top echelons managerial workers, and pseudo-leftists, are attempting to bring down a democratically elected government using all means at that are disposable, fair or foul, and going as far as dirtying Malta’s name in Europe to achieve their aims. In the European Union, some parties like the greens and other right-wing parties are describing Malta as a country where there is no rule of law, and that democracy has failed. This, however, is very far from the truth as the situation is normal except for the protest by a minority which is not affecting anything as it does not enjoy popular support.  The Nationalist Party, the party that represents the interests of the upper classes, have twice in a row, been defeated at the poll, by a landslide. Also, a contradiction has arisen within the PN; the inner circle is involved in an internal struggle to remove their new leader who was elected by the party’s grassroots against the wishes of the PN’s inner circle. Their rhetoric leaves much to be desired and arrogantly declare that government is theirs by right. For instance recently a speaker in one their protest meetings that they are holding right now, declared that the Castille (PM’s office) is theirs by right and that the present administration is there because it had rented the place, disregarding the fact that the electorate has twice rejected them, and yet these persons try to convince us, that they the only defenders of the liberal democracy that is practised in Malta.

The recent murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia, a journalist and a blogger, by a car bomb, is being used as a thin veil excuse for this purpose. Persons that hated and feared her when she was alive are now making her a martyr for justice and truth. To start with Caruana Galizia was neither a crusader against corruption as the BBC has described her after her death, nor the saint as the Maltese middle class wants the world to believe. Her importance is being blown up out of all proportions.  Her murder which was condemned by all quarters of Maltese society is being used to give the false impression that Malta reeks with corruption and that crooks are everywhere. This is being done out of spite as although today’s Labour Party has moved to the centre and has continued a neo-liberal policy as the previous PN administration, they still consider this party, as the party of the working class.

Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Nationalist Party propagandist. She embarked on this career during her student days as an activist against the Dom Mintoff administration back in the 1970’s. Later on she embarked on a journalistic profession and later on she had her personal blog which she used to crucify anyone who acted or said something she did not like. She went as far as attacking the personal life of her victim, his wife or children were not spared. One person came out saying he lost his job and his family had suffered because of a remark he had published on Facebook. His employers scared that she would ruin their business sacked him.  During the 25 year Tenure of PN successive administrations never once she wrote or condemned corruption. Needless to say, there was plenty of it. One big scandal was when the PM Secretary was knifed in the back, his would-be murderer was used as the prosecutor’s witness, to bring to justice those involved, his evidence was not accepted in court, he was exposed as the person who did the stabbing and nothing came out in fact all persons he had accused were all found innocent. It is still a mystery who was behind all this and why the prosecution trusted this unsavoury character.

In 2013 something happened in Malta the Bourgeoisie suffered a landslide defeat. This was unthinkable as like kings of old the PN believes that it has the divine right to govern. At times the Catholic Hierarchy came to their aid to maintain this dictum. Daphne Caruana Galizia who had attacked the Labour Party and its MP’s in opposition now became the main critic of the newly elected Labour Administration with her spies within the public service employees she uncovered all that was going around. Of course, there would be corruption; no administration in Malta was ever free of this as Malta is a capitalist country.  She brought to the attention that a Minister and the PM chief of staff had secret Panama accounts. An action was taken against the Minister involved he was removed from his post. In the case of the PM chief of staff, who is not a civil service employee, but employed on contract,  no action was taken,  as according to the Maltese law it is not illegal to have secret accounts plus the fact that he was giving a good service which would have been lost if he was sacked. In fact, members of the PN acted as agents to help individuals procure secret accounts. One of them today is an MEP.

The Prime Minister Joseph Muscat also came under attack in Caruana Galizia blog she alleged that his wife owned a secret company to which she brought no tangible proof. In fact a person owned up and still it was insisted that this company belonged to the PM’s wife.  The PM reacted by ordering an independent inquiry into these allegations, so far the judge appointed has not concluded his investigations which is overdue as he had ample time to do so. On the first of May the Prime Minister called for early elections. The PN’s battle cry was corruption, and as in 2013 they suffered another landslide defeat, this time even greater.

Something happened within the PN their former leader was made to resign and amongst the contestants, for leadership, there was the nomination for Dr Adrian Delia the President of a local football club. The PN inner circle fought hard to keep him out. However, the paid members of the party thought otherwise by electing him. As soon as he became leader Daphne’s guns were turned on him. She exposed him as a bankrupt businessman who also was involved in shady deals like prostitution in Soho to all these allegations, he denied and answered with 5 libel cases, he even went as far as to call her a whore. Now he has withdrawn all the libels and has become her defender. He was spurned by her family as they did not accept an apology made by him. His co-option in parliament, so he could fill the post as Leader of Opposition, proved to be a difficult task and it took weeks before an elected member was convinced to cede his parliamentary seat. After his co-option and his actions in parliament, some of the PN’s elected MPs took exception to this, as prior to his election he promised a new way of doing things, but he is acting very much like his predecessor.  Now they are working for his dismissal by a vote of no confidence. As things look now it is very possible that he will end up as party leader but not a leader of the opposition. 

In Parliament Delia’s answer to the 2017-2018 Estimates speech was not a critique against the budget put forward by the government, but a tirade against the government asking for the resignations of the Prime Minister, the Attorney General, and the Police Commissioner over the alleged by him the breakdown of the rule of law which again according to him brought about the Galizia Caruana murder. The reasons for this supposedly break down of law which is alleging are that the Police Commissioner and the Attorney General took no action and made no arrests in the Panama Paper scandal and Egrant allegations. As stated above the Maltese law does not consider it illegal to have secret accounts. If today this seems archaic it’s this law that has to go and not the Police commissioner and the Attorney General. Also in Malta, the police must have proof that a crime was committed. They cannot arrest anyone on suspicion. This comes from Malta’s past colonial rule whereby Maltese Laws are similar to those in Britain.

Daphne Caruana Galizia’s murder must be condemned as the criminal act that it actually is, but one must also condemn those who are trying to sanctify her for their political ambitions. Action against corruption must be made always regardless of what party governs.  Citizens that only condemn the other side and completely close their eyes to the mistakes made when the party that they support, is in government are hypocrites. Needless to say, this applies to all.    

Victor Degiovanni

Secretary C.C.

Communist Party of Malta  

On the 100th anniversary of the October Revolution

STATEMENT OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNIST INITIATIVE

On the 100^th anniversary of the October Revolution

The Initiative Communist Parties greet the working class, all working people of Europe on the occasion of the centennial of the greatest event of the XX century – the October Revolution!

October 1917 proved in practice the correctness of the Leninist theory stating that the victory of socialism is possible in one single country or a group of countries, as a result of the uneven development of capitalism. The working class of Russia, driven by a revolutionary theory developed by the vanguard of the class - the Communist Party, accomplished the revolution and embodied the dreams of millions of working people for a better life, for a just social-economic system, whose criterion is not capitalist profit but the satisfaction of the ever-expanding needs of the people.

The world capitalist system moved by its contradictions lead humankind into the First World War which took the lives of many millions of people. The revolutionary uprisings that flared up against this background in Germany, Austria, Italy, Hungary and other countries were cruelly suppressed. The imperialist powers actively intervened in the Civil War in Russia, but were defeated. The revolution won! Its victory confirmed the need for international solidarity of the working class against the capitalists, the possibility of building a socialist society only through the dictatorship of the proletariat, the need to end the bourgeois state, nonparticipation in the bourgeois government and the absence of transitional types of power between capitalism and socialism.

For over seven decades after October 1917, the workers in the Soviet Union experienced unprecedented gains. The world’s first socialist state madetremendous leaps in the economy in the interests of the people, in science,in technology and in the fields of society and culture. The working people of the USSR received the right to work, unemployment and discrimination against women were eliminated. The state of workers and peasants introduced free education at all levels and free medical care for the entire people. Soviet power protected the rest of the working people, provided universal access to culture and sports. The Soviets, as the organisational form of the dictatorship of the proletariat, involved the working people in managing the affairs of society, raising the political level of the masses to unprecedented heights.

Capital in the capitalist countries under the pressure of socialism and tenacious workers’-people’s struggles was forced to make concessions: an eight-hour working day and universal suffrage rights were introduced, the people acquired the right to pensions, benefits, vacation for the first time. The USSR made an enormous contribution to and played the leading role in the smashing of fascism and the Great Anti-fascist Victory of the Peoples. Moreover, the USSR made exceptional contributions through the multifaceted internationalist solidarity that it provided to the peoples in their struggle to overthrow the colonial system.

The defeat of the world’s first socialist state cancelled out the social gains of the working people, both in the socialist countries and in the capitalist countries. It is a temporary setback that does not negate the fact that the era in which we are living in is the era of the transition from capitalism to socialism. We call on the people, the youth to more deeply study the causes, the reality and truth about the dissolution of socialism and to reject the propaganda of the bourgeoisie, the EU, the capitalist governments and their apparatuses, to denounce the falsification of history, and the unacceptable identification of communism with fascism.

Reality proves to us that capitalism is out-dated and can only offer the same thing as 100 years ago — poverty, degradation, wars, cyclical economic crises- and that the only real alternative to this is the invaluable experience of the Great October Socialist Revolution!

We have unshakeable faith and certainty that the working class, the peoples, taking their lead from the ice that was broken and the road that was opened, will carry out more mature, more experienced, more effective and capable socialist revolutions, which this time will be irreversible. In any case, we are living in the era of socialist revolutions which was inaugurated by Great October. The course of history cannot be reversed.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                27/10/2017

                                                                                                                                

Communist Party Comments on the 2017-2018 Budget

The Communist Party of Malta views the Budget presented in Parliament for the year 2017 to 2018 as being positive in many aspects, but understandably it is still lacking in others. To eradicate poverty completely more have still to be done. Although the measures being taken are slow they are on the right track.

Under the present socio-political conditions, where Neo-Liberalism reigns supreme, the party does not expect much more. One cannot expect governmental control over exorbitant rents which are becoming more unaffordable to the working classes in Malta, in a Capitalist system capitalists dictate the terms, not the Government.  Neither can we expect that the minimum wage is raised substantially so that a family can have a decent level standard of living. This, however, should not deter us from continuing the struggle to achieve our aims

The Communist Party of Malta is glad to note that the LP has retained much of its social consciousness of the past, even in today’s situation, where the political parties, have moved away from past political stances.

The Working Class in Malta must once more take on the lead in the struggle for regaining what it had lost in the recent past, the right for, for long-term employment, away, from the precarious jobs, and low wages. Only through Socialism will these conditions improve. Only the working class can embark on the road towards Socialism

Statement of the Secretariat of the ECI on Education

                  

The European Communist Initiative, which rallies 29 communist and workers' parties in its ranks, highlights the major issue of education which concerns school and university students, parents and teachers, the peoples as a whole. Education should be a right, not a privilege-commodity for the few.

In reality, it has been demonstrated that the education system under capitalism does not provide real education and is very expensive. It reflects and reinforces the dominant ideology of the society on which it is based.

The mission of the education system under capitalism is to ideologically prepare the workers of tomorrow so that they are assimilated into the exploitative system at a young age so that they adapt to the needs of the profitability of the monopolies. In capitalist society education systems are critical tools in the maintenance of a class-based society in the interests of the ruling capitalist class designed to perpetuate exploitation.

The reactionary reforms being promoted by the EU and the bourgeois governments reinforce the penetration and intervention of businesses into all levels of education, state spending is being reduced, the commercialization of education is flourishing and the content and results of research are controlled by these forces.

The anti-scientific and even obscurantist theories about nature and society, such as the attempt to discredit and conceal the theory of evaluation, to reproduce unequal relations between men and women. that dominate the education system, the fragmented knowledge and "skills", impede the development of critical thinking and scientific understanding.

The experience that has been accumulated underscores the fact that a plan is underway which aims to co-opt and convert the children of the working class and popular strata into supporters of the EU and NATO through designated programs and funding for lessons, projects, trips that propagandize the “values” of capital and its organizations.

In every country, the working class and the families of the popular strata and their children are paying for the grave consequences of the anti-people political line of the bourgeois governments. The lack of teachers and infrastructure continues and is intensifying.

The education system in capitalism has a deeply class character and aims to produce obedient workers who will not challenge the exploitative system. The poison of anti-communism is utilized in many school books. Socialism and the history of the communist movement are distorted and slandered, as are the history and struggles of the labour-people's movement. There is a devious and ahistorical attempt to equate communism with the monster of fascism. This year we honour the 100th anniversary of the Great October Revolution which brought to the fore a superior organization of society, socialism, which abolished the exploitation of humankind.

The radical eradication of the terrible legacy of illiteracy, the safeguarding of high-level exclusively public and free education for all, the development of educational theory and practice and the elimination of unemployment are amongst the great achievements of socialism. Problems that are related to educational infrastructure, the provision of meals, student accommodation etc, which remain unsolved under capitalism, were resolved by socialism.

The European Communist Initiative emphasizes the need to strengthen the struggle against the reactionary changes that are being promoted by the imperialist centers and the bourgeois governments, against the chronic underfunding of education, the falsification of history, the promotion of anti-scientific theories in schools.

We call on school, university and college students, their parents and teachers, the labour-peoples movement to fight alongside the communists to intensify the struggle for the right of children to real education in line with the requirements of our time, so that education becomes a means to improve the life of humanity and not a tool to perpetuate capitalist exploitation and the profitability of the bourgeois class.

                                                                                           6/10/2017