Repubblika demands Labour sack Muscat and others implicated in Caruana Galizia inquiry report

Civil society group Repubblika on Saturday morning demanded that the Labour Party removes former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, other ministers, officials and persons of trust who were named in this week’s report of the board of the inquiry into the murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.

As the fallout from the board of inquiry’s findings continues to grow, Repubblika presented the letter to Labour Party President Ramona Attard, herself a former member of Joseph Muscat’s public relations team at the Office of the Prime Minister.

Repubblika President Robert Aquilina read the letter out in front of the Labour Party headquarters, calling on the Party to: “bear the burden of responsibility, put aside partisan interests, and truly begin to put Malta first and foremost by taking the actions that are obvious to be taken”.

First and foremost, Repubblika said, the Labour Party needs to immediately initiate proceedings to oust former Leader Joseph Muscat from the party.

“I remind you,” Aquilina said, “that Joseph Muscat was found personally responsible for being at the centre of the deception, harassment, lying and creating the environment of impunity in which the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia could have taken place.

“The gravity of what happened to Joseph Muscat is unprecedented in the history of our democracy. The Labour Party, as the country’s largest party, has an obligation to send a strong message so that behaviour such as that of Muscat and others the inquiry referred to never be repeated in our country’s corridors of power.”

The nation’s very future depends on decisions that will be taken in the coming days, Repubblika warned, and called on all ministers, Members of Parliament, officials, and persons of trust named in the report as “contributors to the impunity of criminals” to be removed  from their capacities.

“These people are not and should not be in politics. The responsibility that the inquiry has placed on them needs to be borne by them and needs to be borne even by the Labour Party.

“These ministers and officials are where they are with the blessing and support of the Labour Party, and we demand that the Labour Party withdraws its support.

“We demand that the Labour Party rejects them and pledges to not field them as candidates in any future election for any public office.”

Repubblika said it is available for dialogue with Ramona Attard, and anyone else from the Labour Party “who shows a willingness to start a true positive transformation of our country”.