[WATCH] Delia accuses government of lacking a plan ‘in all sectors’

Opposition leader said the migration matter is just one in a long list of issues that the government has failed to plan ahead for

Opposition leader Adrian Delia
Opposition leader Adrian Delia

Opposition leader Adrian Delia has said the government has no plan in all the sectors it is managing, as he maintained that the government works by reacting to problems as they crop up. 

Interviewed on the party’s radio station Radio 101, Delia emphasised that the migration problem must be dealt with in a swift and planned manner. 

“I must admit that it is not easy to solve this ever-growing problem, and we will stand by the government as long as it abides by international regulations, but we must ask whether the government has a plan at all,” he said.

Delia also claimed that if there were any personal agreements between former Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and Muscat, regarding the Mediterranean migration problem, the nation must be informed of what they consisted in. 

“If the agreements reached between Renzi and Muscat were regarding matters of statehood, then it does not matter who is in power, such arrangements must be kept. But if the government is hiding something, the people have the right to know,” Delia claimed. 

Turning to the recommendation forwarded by the Malta Financial Services Authority to the European Central Bank that it withdraw Pilatus Bank's license, Delia said that this proved that what he had always said was right, as he underscored that the damage done to Malta could have been prevented had the bank been closed earlier. 

“The bank should never have been opened. Someone has to shoulder responsibility, be it Joseph Muscat or Edward Scicluna, someone has to do it,” he stressed.

Delia said that thanks to the government’s choice of protecting the names of those who commit wrongdoings, Malta’s reputation in the financial sector would now be tarnished. 

Delia also criticised the uprooting of trees which was met with significant criticism, underlining that although he acknowledged the need of some tree-removal in urban areas to improve infrastructure, a "massacre" should not be allowed. 

“While we have the most polluted air in Europe, the government keeps uprooting trees,” he said.

He also touched on the proposals to set up an agency which will be in charge of road infrastructure, which he said was another bid by the government to award tenders to individuals it chooses.

“I suspect this will be another of the government’s dubious schemes,” he remarked.