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WE SWEAR TO FREE MALTA FROM THE SLAVERY, COLONIALISM AND DICTATORIAL ILLEGAL EUROPEAN UNION RULE

TELL YOUR PARLIAMENTARY DEPUTY THAT YOU WANT MALTA TO REGAIN INDEPENDENCE AND FREEDOM

The European Union ordered that in 2011 the Maltese and Gozitan people pay it €68,000,000

€186,000 daily stolen from your childrens mouths

The EU is a threat to the Shipyard

By Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici

According to a report published last Sunday by a correspondent from Brussels for a local newspaper, the European Commission, some months ago, discussed in a number of meetings in Malta, the situation of the Malta Shipyard, and now the Maltese Government is expected to decide what is to happen to the Shipyard.

This information was never given neither by the Maltese Government nor by the European Commission.

It was hidden both from the trade union representatives of the Shipyard workers, the GWU, as well as from the Maltese people and the Maltese Parliament.

It was neither known that some months ago, that is before the General Election, meetings were held in Malta between the European Commission and the Maltese Government about the future of the Shipyard, that is a subject that interests all the people and particularly, the 1,700 workers that work in the Shipyard, and their families that depend on them.

The hiding of important information about the Shipyard has been going on both from the executive management of the Shipyard as well as by the Government.

While it is stated every year what loss was suffered by the Shipyard, the accounts of income and expenditure were never published to be examined so as to know what was going wrong.

While the executive management and the Minister responsible for the Shipyard always blame the lack of productivity of the workers, they never stated the mistakes of those responsible for the running of the Shipyard and the lack of investment, both in the plant and modern tools as well as adjourned technical training of the workers.

A few days ago it became known that last December the Government had told the executive management to hold an inquiry about the great losses that were incurred on the conversion contract of the ship Fairmount.

Had the trade union representatives not talked about it, this very disturbing fact that great losses of millions would not have been discovered.

It is said that on the Fairmount contract, the Shipyard is not going to get paid enough to cover for the materials and subcontracting, and that many excess workers were assigned on the work that had to be done.

Around four months have passed from when a call for an inquiry was made and just the same no information has yet been given about this contract of work.

The Minister responsible for the Shipyard accuses the workers that they had carried defective work and that they had low productivity, while the workers know that the fault is due to the poor leadership, poor planning and wrong calculations by the executive management.

The public was left in the dark about what really happened in the Fairmount contract.

At the same time the propaganda campaign against the Shipyard workers and their union goes on, and deceitful information intended to confound the public about them.

Last Sunday’s report about the Shipyard, the correspondent from Brussels appears in my opinion probably instigated by a representative of the Maltese Government that there is in the European Union, to prepare the road for the atrocious decision about the Shipyard, that the Government is about to announce on the pretext of the national interest.

It is mentioned repeatedly that during the last seven years the Shipyard was given huge amounts of money, but in fact the money was given to workers to leave their employment and not to the Shipyard.

It is said continuously that the Government forgave 300 million debt to the Shipyard, while this is not true because half of them were not Shipyard debt, but were losses of the Marsa Shipbuilding.

These are two examples of the many instances of deceitful information that is maliciously given to influence the public against the Shipyard workers.

Around three months ago in the beginning of March, in a letter that the General Secretary of the GWU Tony Zarb sent to the Prime Minister, as an answer to a letter of the Prime Minister of ten days before, great shortcomings of the executive management of the Shipyard were exposed.

* the work on ship repair was intentionally put aside and not because there was nor market for that work;

* that many foreign workers were being brought even for labour work when this work could easily be done by Maltese workers;

* that one of the best agencies that the Shipyard had for engineering works was lost;

* that work that could easily be done in the Shipyard was being given to contractors;

* that blasting was not being allowed to be done even though it was allowed by EU rules; and

* that a plan was being prepared for the last parts of the Shipyard that are profitable to be given to the private sector.

It does not result that the Government replied to these serious accusations against the executive management of the Shipyard and neither to the insistence of the GWU Secretary General for the Government to explain to the European Union that the Restructuring Plan that the Union imposed in 2002 failed because it was not viable.

It now results that last February, the Government had already agreed with the European Commission what is to happen to the Shipyard after next December.

In fact the Maltese Government even if it wants to cannot do what is best for our country about the Shipyard, but will have to do what is dictated to it by the EU.

It is not true that the Government is going to decide what is to happen to the Shipyard and to its 1,700 workers according to the national interests.

It is going to do what the EU wants, even though what it wants is contrary to the national interests.

The Maltese Government does not have the strength to decide about the Shipyard, in the best interests of our country, because the Maltese Government does not have the courage and the fibre and the national spirit to tell the EU that the interests of the Maltese people and the Maltese workers come before the EU policy and regulations.

The solution for the Shipyard should not be decided by the EU, but should be chosen by the Maltese people in their interests and for the good of the 1.700 Shipyard workers and their families.

In this issue shall be chosen the traitors of the Maltese workers from their defenders.

We hope that all the Maltese trade unionists as well as all the politicians that profess to defend the workers interests should identify themselves with the Shipyard workers and against the EU and those servile to it.

At the price of every sacrifice, the Malta Shipyard has to continue to operate.

Nothing impressionable

Are the Maltese politicians ready to state publicly that where vital interests of our people are concerned, they are ready to put them before the interests of the European Union?

They do not impress us at all, or rather, impress us wrongly, those who publicly boast how much they believe in the European Union.

When they do so, they make us understand that they accept the membership of our country in the EU at all costs, and that they are not going to be ready to protect the interests of our country first and foremost.

We are certain that thousands of Maltese and Gozitans still believe that Malta comes first and foremost, even before the EU.

This is what we, the Campaign for national Independence (CNI) believe, and shall continue to resist those who believe that membership in the EU at all costs, even if they look unfavourably at us.

We did not agree with those of the EU who prior to the Referendum about membership in the EU came to tell us what we should do.

For them the interests of the EU come before those of Malta.

Neither now do we agree with those who come from the EU and tell us what we should do.

We believe that we have the knowledge and ability enough to know what to choose the best for us, much more than the foreigners that do not know us as much as we know ourselves.

We are sorry to note that up to now we did not hear any Maltese politicians say that if serious issues arise between Malta and the EU, they will put the interests of Malta before those of the EU.

We think that one of the reasons why thousands did not vote in the last General Election was this shortcoming of the politicians and the parties of protecting the interests of the Maltese people before any other interest.

The more they bow before the “gods” of the EU, the more they convince us that they are not ready to protect us from that which will hit us very badly because of membership in the Union.

Not so is the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berluscone doing, with respect to the very hot issue of illegal immigrants.

Should not our politicians and leaders also do so to show courage where there are vital interests for our country, and not be afraid to state that they put the interests of the Maltese people and Malta before those of the foreigners and of the European Union?!

If yes, help CNI in its work so that the majority of the people would want to get rid of European Union rule.