It’s A Tale Of Two Presidents At Daphne Caruana Galizia’s Funeral
The family of assassinated journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia has reportedly turned down a request by Malta’s President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca to attend tomorrow’s funeral.
“The Office of the President can confirm that Her Excellency expressed her wish to attend Mrs Daphne Caruana Galizia’s funeral, however, the family, through a third party, affirmed that the presence of Her Excellency was not desired,” a spokesperson for the President was quoted as saying by the Malta Independent.
However, the European Parliament president Antonio Tajani will be attending the funeral, which will be held in the Mosta parish church.
Daphne Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, often pointing out to her readers that she used to work as the Labour Party’s secretary general during the politically turbulent 80s. She once described the President as a “pseudo-socialist now living in the lap of luxury in a former governor’s palace with a retinue to servants and an unlimited hospitality and travel budget”.
After Caruana Galizia’s assassination earlier this month, her sister Corinne Vella dismissed the President’s call for national unity as a sham.
“Marie Louise Coleiro Preca was nominated for the Presidency of Malta in 2014 by Prime Minister and Labour Party leader Joseph Muscat,” she said. “She was active in the Labour Party for 40 years, serving as its General Secretary from 1982 to 1991, a period during which criminal elements dominated the Party.”
“Working in tandem with Muscat’s government, the President is acting to downplay Daphne Caruana Galizia’s assassination and to desensitise Malta’s population to its political implications. The assassination of Malta’s only investigative journalist, who exposed corruption even at the highest levels of government and state, was not planned to look like an accident. It was deliberately designed to be a spectacular act of impunity and made to happen in broad daylight.”
“What Malta needs is justice, transparency, and political accountability, and not for calm to replace justified anger and fear. Coleiro Preca’s call for national unity can only entrench political complaisance and complicity. Malta needs to break the collusion between crime, money, and politics. It needs political action, justice, and change. This cannot happen under Coleiro Preca and Muscat’s watch.”