WATCH: Occupy Justice Activist At Caruana Galizia Vigil: ‘Fuck You, Owen Bonnici!’
Lizzie Eldridge’s speech starts at 28:11
An Occupy Justice activist cursed Justice Minister Owen Bonnici last night over the repeated cleaning of protest items from the Great Siege Monument in Valletta.
“Night after night after night, Owen fucking Bonnici, the minister of fucking justice, has been coming down here with the Cleansing Department and demanding that our peaceful protest be removed,” Lizzie Eldridge said. “Fuck you, Owen Bonnici. Fuck you!”
“What are you scared of, Owen? Are you scared of us? Well, you should be, because we have the force of right on our side. We have the force of truth and justice and democracy on our side, Owen. So who the hell do you think you are, Owen, in the face of what is right?”
“Shall we tell you what’s wrong, huh? I hardly know where to begin, so let’s start with 17 Black. 17 fucking Black. We are not dealing with allegations here, Owen. We are dealing with facts.”
Justice Minister Owen Bonnici
Eldridge was addressing a vigil in front of the Great Siege Monument to mark the 13 month anniversary of Daphne Caruana Galizia’s assassination. During the vigil, protestors ripped off hoarding that had been placed around the monument as part of a restoration and embellishment project. They also placed candles, flowers and a portrait of Caruana Galizia on the monument, but these were promptly removed a few hours later.
Bonnici was targeted because he had personally ordered the Cleansing Department to clean the protest items.
Eldridge, a writer and actress, didn’t hide her fury at the government’s refusal to allow the monument to be used as a memorial for Caruana Galizia.
“Here we are in front of the monument again and I’m actually really pleased because I wasn’t sure what it was going to look like,” she said. “What was Owen Bonnici, the garden gnome and queen of the cleansing committee, going to do next? Who knows? First he hid it, then he turned the banner round because he thought people wouldn’t understand the words ‘Daphne’, ‘Justice’ and so on when it’s back to front. Wrong, Owen, and it didn’t work. So he turned the banner back again and we opened the gate so we could see the monument and the memorial again as it should be.”
People at last night’s vigil for Caruana Galizia. Photo: Occupy Justice
In her speech, Eldridge called for criminal prosecutions over the 17 Black story.
“Konrad Mizzi, Keith Schembri, 17 fucking Black, Yorgen Fenech, Dubai, Electrogas, Socar, Azerbaijan, New Zealand. You name it, they’ve been there and they’ve got their stinking hands all over it, signing deals, hatching plots and signing deals long before their mafia party even got into power. This was your roadmap, this was your best of times and this is your corruption, corruption and corruption.”
“Panama Papers wasn’t enough for you, but of course, that’s the trouble with greed, it doesn’t know where to stop. Money laundering, setting up Pilatus bank, laughing in Castille with Nexia BT, Henley and Partners and Christian fucking Kalin. You thought you got it all sorted out, didn’t you, but the problem with lies is that you always get exposed. The truth will out, the truth IS out and you have been exposed. 17 Black, 17 Black, 17 fucking Black.”
READ NEXT: Culture Minister Finally Gives Deadline For Great Siege Monument Restoration Works To End
