‘Police officers are victims of political interference, conspiracies’ – Simon Busuttil

The police officers’ stellar work is being overshadowed by constant scandals within the police force and political interference and conspiracies, Opposition leader Simon Busuttil said today.

Speaking during an interview on Radio 101, Busuttil paid tribute to the police’s investigation that solved a string of Sliema thefts – arguing, however, that notwithstanding the police’s recent success, the public’s trust in the force is at an all-time low.

The PN leader insisted that the police have been plagued by a series of scandals involving former police commissioners Peter Paul Zammit and Ray Zammit.

“Even though the police officials are doing a stellar job, the political interference and the police commissioners who were chosen by the prime minister himself are overshadowing this,” he said.

The PN leader also called for the government to invest more in the police’s resources and for the police to work harder to solve several unresolved cases of theft and to control a “sense of lawlessness” in the country.

Similarly, he said, the country is fed up of “the institutionalised corruption that has plagued the Labour Party’s legislature,” arguing that as a consequence, the electorate’s trust in the political class has also been affected.

Echoing the GRTU’s call for a 30% reduction in electricity tariffs, the PN leader said the prices should reduce to reflect the drop in the price of oil. Likewise, he said, petrol and diesel prices should also go down.

Insisting that former Labour Party treasurer Joe Sammut had not acted alone in the granting of residence permits and visas to Libyans, the PN leader reiterated his call for a public inquiry to be held.

“Malta issued 14,000 residence permits to people from outside the EU. This was as many as the number of residents in Mosta and as many as the number of asylum-seekers who arrived in Malta in the last 10 years. One can only wonder how many of these residency permits are valid,” Busuttil held.

“Why is the government holding back on the call for a public inquiry if it has nothing to hide?” Busuttil said. The PN leader also argued that the Prime Minister Joseph Muscat should have called the inquiry himself, and that the latter should not have taken three weeks to convene a Security Committee meeting. 

On the situation of traffic, the PN leader claimed that the Maltese are wasting about 10 hours a week stuck in traffic. Echoing the concerns voiced by the majority of respondents to the recent MaltaToday survey, Busuttil insisted that the traffic situation is indeed a nightmare with people getting stuck in traffic on a daily basis.