Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1069175
7 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 9 JANUARY 2019 NEWS licans in the USA, this may be a leap in the dark in the Mal- tese context. Moreover the prospect of a protracted civil war in the main opposition party risks strengthening Joseph Mus- cat's Labour further. 5. Delia wants to pin the blame of defeat on his enemies Delia may well have realised that his party is condemned to a humiliating defeat in next May's local and European elections. Delia also knows that his en- emies may well be engaging in Chinese torture, by further weakening him before these elections only to deliver the final blow after the results are out. By highlighting disunity in his own party and turning against his internal enemies, Delia is pre-empting them bringing the inevitable show- down ahead before next May's election. One can already imagine De- lia saying: "I blame this hor- rendous result on the clique which has prevented me from working and which has done everything to destroy me credibility." on traitors' MATTHEW AGIUS A judge has cleared court ex- pert Martin Bajada to con- tinue his work in both the magisterial inquiry and the compilation of evidence re- lating to the murder of Daph- ne Caruana Galizia. Judge Silvio Meli gave the ruling in the Constitutional case filed in March 2018, by Alfred Degiorgio, one of the men accused of the journal- ist's murder. Degiorgio's lawyers argued that Bajada's appointment to the case violated their client's funda- mental human rights. Bajada is a highly-regarded IT and mobile phone expert who continues to enjoy the trust of several members of Malta's judiciary. But he was convicted of theft and fraud back in 1993 and this had been successfully used to challenge his appointments in the past. The expert regained his standing in January 2017 when the Court of Appeal, in the criminal charges against Franklin Gauci, presided by judge Edwina Grima, had differentiated between situ- ations where the expert is appointed to carry out work that had subjective elements, and ones where experts are simply there to confirm ob- jective facts like call profiles. The court had held that in the latter situation, there was no basis for the substitution of Bajada. This position was con- firmed in March 2017 by another sentence by the su- perior Court of Appeal in Re- public vs Borus. In that case, the superior court of appeal had been presided by the same judge who had decided Chetcuti Bonavita vs Fenech Adami et- the first case which had ordered the removal of Bajada from the case due to his UK conviction for having falsified a signature. Judge Meli made numer- ous references to case law to highlight that in the circum- stances there was no danger to Degiorgio's human rights, dismissing the application. Degiorgio's lawyers had also objected to the fact that for- eign experts had been work- ing in tandem with Bajada, in the compilation of evi- dence for the criminal case. Bajada had been appointed by the inquiring magistrate the day after the journalist's assassination on 16 October 2017. His work was crucial in leading the police to arrest 10 suspects and the subse- quent arraignment of three of them: Degiorgio and his brother George, and Vince Muscat. Court expert cleared to continue work on Caruana Galizia murder case