Watch: ‘Shameful’ – Robert Abela ‘Strongly Condemns’ Manuel Delia’s ‘Tumour’ Remark, Says ‘Hate Speech’ Should Be Investigated
Prime Minister Robert Abela has come out strongly against journalist and activist Manuel Delia comparison of Franco Debono’s return to the political agenda to a “re-emerging tumour”.
“It’s shameful,” Abela said yesterday when asked by a NET journalist whether he condemns the likes of Rosianne Cutajar, whose return to the Labour Party he recently said he was reconsidering.
“I completely condemn the hate speech there was on Franco Debono,” Abela doubled down when pressed. “I condemn it in the most powerful way possible.”
“I think the Nationalist Party should take some ideas from the valid people within its ranks, and not tell them they’re irrelevant,” the prime minister continued.
View this post on Instagram
Ever since Manuel Delia’s comments on Franco Debono, a number of politicians have come out to criticise the Repubblika activist… including those within PN itself.
On Monday, PN MP Alex Borg came out swinging, saying Delia “doesn’t know what a tumour is and he doesn’t understand the consequences of his words” and calling his comments “hatred”.
New PN MEP candidate Miriana Calleja Testaferrata De Noto echoed Borg’s sentiment, saying “when you lose someone close to you to cancer, which Alex and I both have, you realise that such things should never be politicised or even used as insults.”
Meanwhile, readdressing the situation with Rosianne Cutajar, Abela repeated that he believed the independent MP had “paid the price of what happened, once, twice, three times, and she shouldn’t have a life sentence because of it.”
What do you make of this latest development in the ongoing Delia-Debono saga?
READ NEXT: Muscat's Marċ: 'Invictus' Memorialised In Master's Composition Announced On Former PM's Birthday
