Occupy Justice turns down Adrian Delia’s advances

Adrian Delia’s efforts to warm up to anti-corruption campaign group Occupy Justice by arguing that he has a respectful relationship with activists were rudely shut down this afternoon.

The Nationalist Party leader said on TVM’s Xtra that he holds a good relationship with activists, insisting the criticism towards him did not prevent him from communicating with the people involved.

But in a statement on Friday, Occupy Justice insisted on clarifying the relationship: “Our relationship with the Leader of the Opposition, Adrian Delia, is exactly the same as the one we have with the Prime Minister, which means it is non-existent.”

And the activist organisation went one step further, accusing both leaders of failing to uphold justice.

“Both men have, in the eyes of all the women of #occupyjustice, failed to uphold justice and good governance, and both sit back, at times even taking ‘smiley’ selfies together, all this while Malta is rotting in corruption,” the statement read.

The group noted that it was born on the day that the Opposition leader chose to carry on with the Budget discussions in Parliament, instead of walking out in defiance when the government refused to debate the motion on the murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.

“It was at that point that we realised that neither the government nor the Opposition were going to defend us, the women and men in the street - for them it was simply a case of business as usual,” the activists said.

Occupy Justice said that “contrary to government spin”, they had no leader, no public relations person, no president or chairperson.

“None of us are involved in partisan politics. There is no one individual who runs the show – we are a collective, of women. We all have families and we all work. We are well aware of the risks we are taking,” the group said.