Repubblika’s Robert Aquilina has filed for a protection order for him and his family amid an “intimidating and hostile environment” that has seen a number of threats made against the NGO President.

In a legal letter to Prime Minister Robert Abela and Police Commissioner Angelo Gafa, lawyer Therese Comidini Cachia on behalf of Aquilina noted the threats the Aquilina family had been facing.

“No one can dispute that this polarised political culture is ongoing. Aquilina’s work has been dismissed or disparagingly referred to in political activities, at times even by people holding public office or people close to or have the support of people in public office,” she said.

She noted that Aquilina’s “wife and children were targeted in threatening letters” and that “a threatening message was verbally sent to him by a person not of Maltese nationality that they would see to Aquilina themselves”.

The letter called out the authorities for only being willing to protect Aquilina when there is “clear evidence of a real and immediate risk of a specific attack”.

“This means they only want to protect Aquilina when the knife is already metaphorically at his throat.”