At the time of writing, Daphne Caruana Galizia has been dead for 39 months. The campaign to isolate her, to discredit her and to ostracise her is much older than that and remains very much an ongoing function of the undemocratic and the corrupt.
No one has faced trial for her murder yet.
Joseph Muscat, Keith Schembri, Konrad Mizzi, Chris Cardona and several others are no longer in office, and whether they admit to it or not, they were forced out of office in disgrace in the aftermath of the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. In spite of arrests, interrogations, police bail and other displays of half-hearted institutional muscle-flexing, they have as yet faced no criminal consequences for their actions and continue to deny any wrongdoing.
On the political level the government, the political party in government, its media and its support base have never truly confronted the true horror of the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia. The truth is hidden or denied. There has been no apology, no regret, no political apportionment of responsibility. Instead, Robert Abela, the head of the government and of the party in government, insists that it is time to turn the page on the case of Daphne Caruana Galizia. This even though the page remains unread by many.
We remain therefore frustrated, angry and disappointed as even now our institutions fail, or refuse, to realise that the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia should have a transformative effect on the workings of Malta’s polity and society. The manner in which institutions persist in ignoring, suppressing and denying the truth about what happened and what continues to happen is not merely a grave injustice to Daphne and her family – though it is also that – but an outrage to Malta’s democracy.
The official story plays to the tune that Daphne’s memory is an impediment to the country’s welfare.
In the midst of all this, this Inquiry has been a shining exception to Malta’s broad institutional failure. Irrespective of what your final conclusions might be, the experience of this Inquiry has been exceptional for several reasons but particularly for the fact that people in authority were forced to answer questions they would rather not have had to answer in a room that was open to the public.
For this, Repubblika is deeply grateful to the Board.
In the rest of this document, we will submit for your consideration our views on the questions asked of it by its terms of reference.3