Collecting money during the pandemic by Adrian Delia

With the donation presented yesterday by Adrian Delia to Id-Dar tal-Providenza, it should be clear to all that Adrian Delia is moving on and is not involved in Soho prostitution and more importantly the Labour Party was afraid of him when he was PN party leader. If Adrian Delia’s real money was from brothels, as alleged by Daphne Caruana Galizia way back, I doubt he would be working for a Financial company. Besides, I don’t think that id-Dar tal-Providenza would accept this amount. Delia himself stated that before this donation was made, he was in contact with the director of this institution.

I wish to recall what Pope Francis told all Church administrators and directors that the Church should be careful not to use or accept money which derives from illicit activities. The Pope was very clear. He stated that Church organizations should not accept money coming from dubious sources.

The fact that id-Dar tal-Providenza accepted the cheque of €500,000 is a clear indication that the money being offered is not illicit.

Despite these assurances, there were a number of stalwart Bernard Grech supporters, among them Leone Ganado and Austin Sammut, who used the CSN platform  to attack this donation and to cast doubts about the origins of the money. Is this a case of sour grapes or is it one of racism? Sour grapes because Delia has pulled off a laudable feat when the present PN has not even tried to be charitable this unique Christmas or is it a case of racism because the company making the donation is owned by a Tunisian with contacts across the wider Arab world?

Would Leone Ganado and Sammut have launched the same attacks had the €500,000 been donated by a fully owned Maltese company? I very much doubt it. It is opportune to remind readers that Leone Ganado is an auditor and very close to Archbishop Charles J. Scicluna.

What can be ascertained is that this issue of money laundering has now become an obsession; in fact a very convenient one to detract from other more serious situations evolving on our island.  Money laundering has always existed even on this little island of ours but since joining the EU this crime has mushroomed out of control.   This explains one of the reasons why the Brits have left the EU. Now even history is proving them right. But it is extremely unfair that doubts are cast on any charitable deed that Adrian Delia makes. My humble advice to these gentlemen is that charity begins at home where due diligence is concerned. In other words, what about the funds that these so-called civil society organizations are getting? Should these organizations be subjected to due diligence processes, as happened in Hungary, to ascertain that the money that they are receiving is coming from clean and honest sources?

One would have expected that the 1st tier members of the Nationalist Party would have collected a good sum for id-Dar tal-Providenza. What they were able to collect was a paltry sum of €1000. In the meantime, I am sure that NET TV was earning money for trasmitting this good cause marathon. While I do believe that every cent is important, I wish to remind readers that Adrian Delia supporters independently collected €22,750 for id-Dar tal Providenza. As the saying in Maltese goes, one can eat with the poor but die of hunger with the rich!Incidentally, Adrian Delia’s gesture goes to show us all what a capable manager he is. To collect and donate such a large sum during this  pandemic is no mean feat. A feat the present PN administration is not capable of matching or remotely conceiving. More the pity, because by their current stance, they are revealing their Fascist leanings. They attack left, right and centre to shield themselves from their own shortcomings. They resort to accusing others of being negative and corrupt etc without, incidentally, having the guts to substantiate their accusations because they cannot. They live in the hope that, by repeatedly writing that “x” is scum, “y” is corrupt and so on and so forth, the man in the street will become so indoctrinated as to vote for PN. How wrong they are. The man in the street is quite savvy these days and will not be taken in any longer.