An insult to the judiciary

The nominations of lawyers Ingrid Zammit Young and Caroline Farrugia Frendo to the magistrates’ bench have been mired in controversy and left the current government with another egg on its face. Apart from highlighting all that is wrong with the current administration, they have also re-ignited the discussion on appointments to the judiciary.

It is also the second time in less than a month that decisions taken by Muscat’s government have been condemned by a Constitutional body. In January it was the NAO which highlighted the “collusion” between Castille and Gaffarena in the Old Mint Street expropriation deal, the cover-up attempt which occurred in the succeeding months’ with fraudulent changes in the relevant minutes and correspondence, and how Parliamentary Secretary Michael Falzon went ahead with signing the deal notwithstanding being warned against by two officials in the civil service.

This time, it was the Commission for the Administration of Justice which deemed the nomination of Ingrid Zammit Young as unconstitutional, something which anyone who can read already knew. But there you go, the Prime Minister who never decides needed once again to put the onus of the decision on someone else, and threw in the equation the Commission which monitors the behaviour of sitting magistrates and judges. A role which never included determining the eligibility of the nominated ones (a responsibility which sits entirely within Cabinet), as the Chamber of Advocates correctly pointed out.

Mind you, these are not mistakes as the Prime Minister tries to paint them. These are deliberate attempts at disregarding the Constitution to reward friends. Attempts which have thankfully been stopped in their tracks by the Opposition and the investigative work of the independent media. We can only wonder at how many other ‘attempts’ are succeeding and slipping through under the radar.

The disregard for Constitutional provisions in these nominations is worrying indeed. The independence of the judiciary is one of the basic pillars of a democratic society. The responsibility of a magistrate is enormous: he or she sits in judgement of people’s actions with the power to send them to up to 12 years in prison. A magistrate is also invested with an enormous power when heading an inquiry. Therefore the importance that such nominations are meritocratic and above board cannot be stressed enough.

Notwithstanding this, we have watched the government trying to appoint the sitting chairperson of the Employment Commission – a commission which, in some cases, may decide on complaints concerning the government itself.

The Constitution bars the sitting members of this Commission from being appointed to the judiciary for at least three years after they last sit on the Commission, and for a reason: we never have to question whether the Commission is appeasing the government to curry favour for itself. Nominating the sitting chairperson, which we now also know prepared herself for the role by taking out a voluntary redundancy package from her employer, sheds doubt on all past and future judgements decided by the Commission in which the government may be involved. That is why this nomination is such a serious matter.

On the other hand, the blatant nepotism shown in the nomination of Caroline Farrugia Frendo, daughter of Speaker Anglu Farrugia, is an insult to the whole judiciary. I will not enter into the merits of her experience or lack of it in the Courts (something which has been highly questioned by others). It is obvious that even though seven years may soon pass since her oath of office, she has not been working at the Courts throughout the whole period, and is ineligible at the time of her nomination.

But even if she were the most competent and eligible lawyer for the role, the fact that her father is the sitting Speaker should have been enough for the government to refrain from appointing her to any position which does not entail an open, transparent and competitive process. Such a nomination sheds doubt on all the Speaker’s past and future rulings, including his reasons for the questionable and controversial ‘investigation’ in the measly €70 weekly the Leader of the Opposition’s car consumes in fuel.

And the simple fact that Dr Farrugia Frendo does not have the maturity and sense of judgement to refuse such a nomination not to embarrass and put in a bad light her father’s position, is proof in itself that she lacks the maturity and sense of judgement required to decide upon other people’s lives.

Labour has promised to change the procedure for appointing magistrates and judges according to the Bonello report, which it itself commissioned. A Private Member’s Bill implementing these changes has also been moved in Parliament by the Opposition. The ball is entirely in Muscat’s and Bonnici’s court. Unfortunately, we have been told they only want to implement it at the end of the legislature, to allow themselves more rounds of questionable appointments to the bench and keep using even the judiciary as either a payment for services rendered or to sop down the aggrieved.