Decapitation alone will not solve the problem

I can understand why civil society and green groups have turned all their guns on Planning Authority boss Johann Buttigieg. 

Buttigieg epitomises the authority’s servile attitude—a rubber stamp for unbridled development that has no end. 

Yet beyond the WhatsApp chats between Buttigieg and Yorgen Fenech that are more than embarrassing, the problem of planning and development goes much further. It certainly goes further than having Buttigieg’s head on a silver platter.

The problem is the political will to change direction when it comes to planning policies. As I see it, the Abela administration has no intention of changing the tempo when it comes to the construction mania in this country.

Though many other Cabinet members do not share his point of view, Abela is adamant not to stifle the construction industry. He will simply not stand in its way. His riposte in Cabinet to any suggestion that ‘we’ should slow down has been frigid; dismissive, even.

Johann Buttigieg is, in this respect, the perfect administrator for Abela’s doctrine, which is why he was drafted back last year to replace Oliver Magro. Buttigieg is more efficient and has no qualms waving the green light for certain development.

The green groups know that Buttigieg is the construction industry’s best ally and best investment. It’s no wonder the construction lobby applauds him and defends him.

The problem is that Robert Abela genuinely is unperturbed seeing Malta turn itself into a sea of apartments and hotels replacing traditional villages, valleys or agricultural land. He believes that there is an economic plus side to all this and that people prefer it to nostalgia and beauty. And he knows that construction and speculation generate immense wealth.

What he does not see is that people, including many Labourites are genuinely sick and tired of this love affair with the construction lobby. Some call it incest.

The Labour Party has always had a problem with safeguarding the environmental and cultural heritage of this country. But the party’s attitude today is shockingly abysmal with no or few delegates willing to speak their mind.

Robert Abela is no fool. He knows he has a problem. The Yorgen Fenech verdict shocked him as much as it shocked the nation. He knows that the verdict immediately accentuated and amplified every problem on the government’s doorstep. 

Significantly, the verdict brought together all those civil society groups and individuals that found it difficult to work together and speak with one voice in the past.

But Johann Buttigieg is an easy target. Unabashedly pro-development, he encompasses the traits those opposed to Abela’s politics find no discomfort in disliking. Dislike and hate are two different words, but I can feel hate slowly creeping in. And that is dangerous.

The narrative on both sides needs to change.  The green groups need to explain that the real solution is an overhaul of planning policies. Change does not come with decapitation alone.

On his part, the prime minister needs to adopt a sensible narrative that shuns unchecked development. Development is a monster that is destroying this country, making the rich richer, communities frustrated, feeding unsustainable population growth and dependence on massive third country national employment, infrastructural expansion that is excessive and an irrevocable destruction of our environmental and historical and cultural heritage.

Robert Abela cannot look the other way. He needs to act fast.

Journalism

If there was one small similarity, I shared with Daphne Caruana Galizia, it was our reluctance to be part of the IGM, formerly the Malta Press Club. Both of us never entertained the Press Club; we never participated in the annual awards by proposing our own stories. We were not members.

In my case, it stemmed from my revulsion to the fact that at the time the Malta Press Club was sponsored by the Tumas Fenech Foundation, an entity sponsored by Yorgen Fenech’s family. And my opposition at the time to the Hilton development made it difficult for me to be part of the Press Club. The umbilical cord between the IGM and the Tumas Fenech Foundation was cut after Yorgen Fenech was arrested and charged with masterminding Daphne’s assassination. But that is only a memory worth mentioning.

What I am slightly confused with, is the belief by some young journalists and the IGM that they should not be regulated. Admittedly, regulated is an ugly word. But self-regulation is not.

I can understand that the idea of warrants might be going a bit too far, but what is wrong if journalists acknowledge their profession and identify the criteria that make one a true professional journalist?

I say this because every democratic country has a definition of a journalist and acknowledges that there are certain characteristics or behaviours that do not suit the title of journalist. Many countries have a body that blocks or identifies the bad apples.

I acknowledge, this may not be time to discuss this subject, but we need to think about it.

The discussion needs to be widened and defining the role and future of journalists cannot take place without the involvement of the media houses that employ journalists and media workers. The media houses are the ones that take the risks to keep this far from lucrative business alive.

So, while the words of PN leader Alex Borg on the need of a warrant for journalists were summarily shot down, it does not mean there should not be a serious discussion about recognition, auto-regulation and professional development. And such a discussion cannot take place only with a small group of interested professional journalists and media workers, but with everyone in and out of this industry.