Maltese Author Warns Cutajar Being Humiliated ‘Because She Is A Woman’ And Says Chats Should Not Have Been Published
Leading Maltese author Lara Calleja has stood up for PL MP Rosianne Cutajar after her WhatsApp texts with murder suspect Yorgen Fenech were published yesterday.
“Everyone has a right to privacy and no one has the right to publish personal messages, especially those of a sexual nature,” Calleja said after the chats were leaked by fellow author Mark Camilleri.
Insisting that she isn’t expressing support for any dirty deeds Cutajar may have been involved in, Calleja warned that the MP is being targeted because she is a woman.
“First as a woman and second as a human being, I must show support for this disparaging act where another woman was humiliated on a low and personal level – yes because she is a woman,” she said.
“Where are the sexual messages of male politicians? God only knows what their WhatsApp messages contain. But let’s say that sexism doesn’t exist in Malta (hahaha) and that we’re all equal (hahaha)… no matter if it was a man or woman, no one has a right to see their private chats if they have nothing to do with their political work.”
“The majority of the messages that were published yesterday could have been cut out and only the relevant ones published. The rest was just a personal attack, an attack against women and what ‘they shouldn’t represent’.”
While some people supported Calleja’s stance, others argued the leak should be viewed in the context that Cutajar had sued Camilleri for libel for claiming in his book A Rent Seeker’s Paradise that she had an affair with Fenech to advance herself politically.
“[Cutajar] had known [Camilleri] had the proof and yet persisted down that path, and no leaked gossip is scarier than that,” Brikkuni artist Mario Vella warned. “The impunity they felt was so large that the humiliation is merited at this stage, considering she had enough time to resign and drop the libel.”
Calleja later revised her position, stating that while she still believes many of the messages were intended to personally intimidate Cutajar, there is “too long a history of trickery and corruption on this story”.
“I don’t want the victim to be a person who ultimately doesn’t ‘deserve it’. In its sole context, yes I believe many of the messages were published for nothing and I felt angry seeing how someone’s personal life was placed under public scrutiny. However, there are no victims in this story and a certain outcome was widely expected.”
Cutajar today asked the Criminal Court and the Attorney General to intervene on the grounds that the material likely originated from Fenech’s phone, which police seized after he was arrested for the murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
The courts have banned the publication of content from Fenech’s phone.
Cover photo: Left: PL MP Rosianne Cutajar, Right: Author Lara Calleja
The article has been amended to include Calleja’s revised position
Do you think the public has a right to see these chats given the context?
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