People beg for donations while public money is squandered

There could not have been two more contrasting stories last week. 

On the one hand, it was reported that the Marigold Foundation, headed by Michelle Muscat, spent €365,114 in undisclosed “expenses” over a period of four years. The last audited accounts submitted by the foundation showed that almost half of all donations were spent on “campaigns, events and other operating expenses”.  When a charity spends so much on expenses, rather than to actually help those in need, then something is drastically off. Even the word ‘donations’ is not quite correct because most of it seems to have come from government entities, in other words, our taxes. 

The very raison d’etre of this foundation is also rather airy fairy. According to the website: “Our objective is to positively empower people and to work with them to raise standards, support initiatives and strengthen voices.” 

I’m not sure what that means in real terms, but further down it becomes slightly more explanatory: “We also address specific aspects of it, such as social behaviour, health issues, special needs and education.” 

Again, that is still too opaque to justify what this foundation stands for. There is a whole section dedicated to social media downloads of material related to rare diseases (another of Michelle Muscat’s pet projects), including posters carrying vague slogans, videos and even Instagram filters. One visual claims “Rare is Strong! Proud! Many!”. 

How this is supposed to actually help someone with a rare disease is anybody’s guess. There are school kits and info packs and it goes on and on.  All this costs money - so forgive me for pointing out the obvious but shouldn’t the money spent on all this fancy, glitzy promotion be going to someone suffering from a rare disease instead? 

In complete and utter contrast, there was the heart breaking story of Shawn Mifsud, a father of two who was struck by tragedy in the prime of his life. Last August he caught a viral infection which put his entire body into septic shock. As a result, at the age of 37, both his hands and both his legs had to be amputated.

His shocking story quickly went viral as the family went public with a fundraiser in order to raise enough money for Shawn to be fitted with bionic hands which cost around €200,000 (the simple prosthetics provided by the government do not allow him to have a wide range of movement). The public responded with a flood of donations but at the same time the question on everyone’s lips was, why do people have to resort to asking for donations themselves in such cases? 

As the outcry grew louder, the Malta Community Chest Fund on Friday finally issued a statement that “contrary to the impression given on social media”, it had already been in touch with the Mifsud family “to identify the kind of help that can be provided.”  While this is a positive step forward, it is still not quite clear how much they will be given and whether it will be enough. 

The issue here is that those who are genuinely in need of financial aid due to health issues often resort to raising the funds themselves because the money is often needed immediately. I understand that charities have a waiting list, and that there needs to be some kind of vetting system and that cases are treated according to their priority… but this is where the government needs to step in. And this is where the squandering of public money (as seems to be the case above with the Marigold Foundation) not only rankles, but is deeply unethical and scandalous. 

There are other aspects to charity fundraising which merit discussion. When we see the day long fundraiser for the MCCF known as L-Istrina which is held annually and televised on all the major stations, the issue of who is donating so generously with big fat cheques also comes up.

As rightly pointed out by Franco Debono on social media: “Today, our country celebrates the National Day of Hypocrisy. We spend our time convincing ourselves that we are a more generous people than others, or that we are more united than others when in reality we are just like any other people, with our good and bad qualities. Worse still, we think that by showing up with a cheque, our sins are forgiven... Going out and posing with big cheques for the whole world to see, while evading taxes, is not charity. Even those who genuinely want to do charity are undermined by this spectacular and theatrical format.” 

He added that rather than this “fake charity”, it is the state which should provide for serious illnesses and make them a priority and not humiliate the sick by making them depend on charity. 

I can see his point, which was so starkly underlined by the case of Shawn Mifsud and others like him. When one is hit like a bolt of lightning out of the blue by a health issue which completely turns your life upside down, the financial blow can often exacerbate the anxiety caused by the illness itself. There should not be any need for begging or grovelling, but a proper system where cases are assessed accordingly and help is provided as soon as possible. No red tape, no senseless bureaucracy or making people wait for agonisingly long months for a reply. There’s no need to set up another fancy quango either, just a government department which uses staff from its already bloated list of civil servants. 

These are the type of worthy causes that most of us wish to see our taxes go towards - I doubt anyone would begrudge $200,000 being given to Mr Mifsud (just to use his example). It is certainly more palpable than to learn of our money being thrown away to pay self-styled consultants (usually disgraced MPs who were forced to resign) who manage to wangle their way back onto the public payroll through some fancy title and creative accounting. 

It really gets my goat to see these people still leeching off the public coffers just so that they are kept happy (and so they won’t rock the boat with criticism of the current government).  Why don’t they go get a job on their own merits like the rest of us?  The tens of thousands they are earning each year (for what exactly?) which can easily run into millions when taken as a whole, would be more than enough to help those in dire straits. 

It is high time this administration understands that by keeping a few of its inner circle happy with such shamelessly lucrative contracts, it has completely alienated a sizeable chunk of the population which is no longer impressed by its empty rhetoric.