Is it worth it?

I read the story of the three Identity Malta employees who have been charged with corruption and extortion for facilitating the issue of residence permits, and the bit which immediately jumped out at me was that they are all in their early 20s. They are two young women aged 24 and 21 (who pled guilty), and one young man aged 21, who has pleaded not guilty.

The amount of money which allegedly exchanged hands has not yet been made public but I wondered how much money could possibly have been worth the risk they took, which has now led to them having a criminal record at such a young age? Not only that, but what kind of mindset leads people so young to be so cynical and so easily corruptible? Or maybe I’m just being hopelessly idealistic yet again to think that in your early 20s and holding down what is presumably a good office job, you should still be on the straight and narrow.

I always find it shocking that bribes and kickbacks are so casually entered into, and then I am shocked again about just how blasé some people seem to be about these type of stories. I suppose those who agree to be a party to such things obviously think they can get away with it, and that no one will ever be any the wiser, while those who shrug these incidents off, tend to come out with the usual spiel which is trotted out with depressing regularity, “this is how things are done here, they always have, and they always will be”. It is as if many have given up hope of us ever rising above the temptation of all that glitters, and aspiring to be better people.

What cannot be denied is that there is a definite sickness at the core of our society; a sickness which has grown deeper over the years and is now so pervasive that it gives real meaning to that colloquial phrase, “ma tista’ taħlef għal ħadd” (you cannot swear by anyone).

You look around at our politicians, people in places of high authority and members of the civil service and you would be hard-pressed to say for sure that this person or that one is completely and utterly above board and cannot be bought. Who knows? Placed in a position where one yields some type of power or authority, who is to say which person would be able to turn down the tantalizing offer to take a gift in cash or in kind under the table for doing someone a “favour”?

Certainly, few of us would have thought that someone like Dr Joe Cassar, a respected man in his profession of psychiatry, a former Health Minister and a Shadow Minister for the Nationalist Party, who so passionately denied receiving anything from the notorious Gaffarena, should turn out to be someone who allegedly accepted the “gifts” reported in yesterday’s front page edition of MaltaToday. Again, what got me about this story was not so much that he agreed to these freebies, but that he was so ready to “sell” himself and his integrity so cheaply.

Of course, this does not mean that this has wiped the slate clean when it comes to the millions which this government has paid Gaffarena in that sweet property deal (because the huge implications of that deal have irreparably stained and damaged the Labour party) but with one fell swoop the PN has just zapped its own moral high ground which has disintegrated under its feet.

Not only do two wrongs not make a right, but the two wrongs have become even wronger. It just underscores how easily politicians allow themselves to be embroiled with the wrong sort in exchange for campaign funding. It would have been bad enough if hundreds of thousands of Euro had been involved, but to throw it all away for what amounts to just over €9,000 (€8,150 for construction works on his private home paid for by Gaffarena, and the car given to him by Gafferena, for which the latter refused payment and which was translated into a €1,000 donation by Cassar to the PN), just seems so tacky and really unnecessary.

For crying out loud, was Cassar really so hard up that he needed someone to gift him with a CCTV system because he could not afford to pay for it himself? Or does something weird happen to people when they have been elected where they suddenly start interpreting these “gifts” as perks which come with the job, rather than seeing them with clear 20/20 vision as the corrupting influence which they are? And did it never occur to him that no one does anything for free without wanting some kind of payback in return?

It immediately brought to mind the case of the judge who was bribed with embarrassingly little things: such as free meals at restaurants and having his wife’s car fixed for free. Somehow the mundaneness of these “freebies” made it worse because it cheapened the judge’s whole persona as well as his office.

When someone throws away their own standing in society by not only mingling with unsavoury types but accepting gifts (whether large or small) from them in this way, it just speaks volumes. It shows that we have a long way to go to emerge from the “I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine” type of mentality which permeates our political scene.

And while Dr Joe Cassar yesterday afternoon resigned from his post as Shadow Minister, despite their attempts at spinning this into some kind of act of valour, I don’t think the PN have anything to pat themselves on the back about. After all, he has still not resigned his parliamentary seat. In his latest statement he said: “Although I have done nothing that breaches any law I have allowed an unscrupulous person to take advantage of me. The fact that this happened some three years ago is no excuse and I apologise unreservedly to the electorate for my error of judgement.”

I guess no one has ever told him that when he finds himself in a hole, he really should stop digging.