Owen Bonnici Clears Daphne Protest Site Issuing Plea For Sympathy: ‘I Try To Follow My Duty And Instead Repubblika Takes Me To Court’
The Daphne Caruana Galizia protest site beneath the Great Siege Monument in Valletta appears to have been cleared once again, with Minister for Justice and Culture Owen Bonnici issuing a statement pleading sympathy for following his duty.
“I see to it that the monument is protected and cleared regularly as is my duty, but instead the NGO Repubblika took me to court, open a constitutional case against me, accuse me of a lot of things with a decision expected this month.”
“I ask – is it fine that the Great Siege Monument is treated this way when everyone has the right to apply for an appropriate monument?”
“Why do we have to damage a National Monument to express ourselves?” Bonnici asked in a social media post.
A point of contention between the state and activists, the protest site kept workers from the government’s cleansing department busy over the last two years, with the memorial regularly being cleared during the night.
The orders came directly from Bonnici.
This unexpectedly drew to a close when protests were at their height in December. For weeks the site remained untouched. However, it appears this has now changed.
Writing on social media, activist group Occupy Justice wrote:
“We remind the Injustice minister Owen Bonnici that this is a protest site and not a shrine. It’s there to remind him that justice has not been served, whatever he might say about the courts. And we also remind him that any (superficial) damage has been significantly contributed to by the careless removal and dumping of candles by his own cleaners.”
“We continue to maintain and clean the memorial, to preserve its integrity while used as a protest site. It would be much better if Bonnici focused on the dirt all around him and under his nose, which has damaged our reputation irreparably.”
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