Labour TV boss Jason Micallef in Facebook rant on ‘extremists’ over Repubblika protest

The Valletta Cultural Foundation boss and chairman of Labour TV channel One has branded civil society group Repubblika “extremists” for announcing a protest on Monday evening in a renewed call for justice for Daphne Caruana Galizia.

Taking to Facebook, Jason Micallef called the NGOs “extremists” and accused them of stirring up trouble. “Extremists are people who instigate, disrupt and hinder when things do not go their way,” he said.  

He claimed the NGOs, who led the protests during the December 2019 political crisis, did not want justice for Caruana Galizia’s murder, because they had been left ‘stunned’ by the suggestion from Police Commissioner Angelo Gafà that “every person, from mastermind to executioner” in the assassination, had been apprehended.

Micallef said that the protest would only highlight “their extremist beliefs”.  

NGOs Repubblika, #occupyjustice and manueldelia.com said they will be organising the protest in front of parliament, calling out the Prime Minister Robert Abela for “rushing to close the case”.

“This self-congratulation, which is by no means justifiable, is being used to undermine a country and forget the impunity that politicians still enjoy for the corruption they have committed and who have benefited from the murder of a journalist who was assassinated for exposing them,” they said.  

Last Wednesday, police commissioner Angelo Gafà also said that police had no evidence in hand so far that connected any politician to the Caruana Galizia and Carmel Chircop murders.

Gafà said police confiscated two cars, more than €70,000 in cash, fire arms, cash counting machines, 25 mobile phones and two laptops from residences in Baħrija and Swieqi. 

Another 10 cars that were found at one of the residences are expected to be confiscated as well. 

On Friday, reports revealed how the former Labour minister for the economy, Chris Cardona, has been implicated in an aborted 2015 plot to kill journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, by Vincent Muscat ‘il-Kohhu’.