Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1540302
6 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 27 MARCH 2022 OPINION 2 maltatoday EXECUTIVE EDITOR KURT SANSONE ksansone@mediatoday.com.mt Letters to the Editor, MaltaToday, Vjal ir-Rihan, San Gwann SGN 9016 E-mail: dailynews@mediatoday.com.mt Letters must be concise, no pen names accepted, include full name and address maltatoday | SUNDAY • 12 OCTOBER 2025 An indictment of our mad lives Editorial NO parent should ever witness the death of their children… and yet it happens. That is the nature of life. Children die, leaving grieving parents and sib- lings behind, trying to pick up the pieces of a life that must go on. In these circumstances, the void left be- hind is often filled with a screaming silence: Why did this have to happen to our child? People have different ways of rationalising the pain caused by the death of a child. Getting over it is not an option. Getting used to it is a hard slog. But when the death of a child is the result of trag- ic circumstances, the parents' pain is deeper, the remorse punishing and the scar everlasting. The million what ifs that accompany such a loss are but answerless questions that will forever torment the parents. The latest tragic incident involving a one-year- old boy has understandably shocked the country. Here was a mother, like thousands of other wom- en and men, who had to drop off her son at the childcare centre before heading to her workplace at Mater Dei Hospital. For some reason, she got al- ienated and forgot her son inside the car. She dis- covered him dead some six hours later when she went to pick him up from the childcare centre only to realise that she never dropped him off. It is painful to even try and comprehend the child's agonising death and even harder to under- stand what the boy's mother and father are passing through. Many passed judgement on the woman; cruel words that serve no purpose but to perpetuate the agony and the guilt. And yet many others, mostly parents with young children, have shown incredible understanding. The tragedy could have happened to anyone caught in the mad rush of life. Parents juggling full-time jobs, house chores, home loans, bills, shuttling of children for after school activities, school meet- ings, parent WhatsApp chats, family messaging groups, work emails, countless to-do lists, driving grandparents to hospital appointments, quick gro- cery store stops, all on very little sleep—it has be- come all a mad rush. And in this chaotic existence, tragedy is very often averted only by chance. But when tragedy does strike, the loss is unimaginable and the guilt punishing. In these circumstances the mother, the father, the siblings need empathy. In these circumstances saying nothing is better than trying to say some- thing stupid. In these circumstances there are very few words that can console the grief. Most parents would know this. To the keyboard warriors writing on social me- dia from behind the comfort of their screen: Your judgement is not solicited—shut up! There is a police investigation and a magisterial inquiry underway—after all, a child has died and the state has a responsibility, on all our behalf, to determine whether there are grounds for responsi- bility to be shouldered. The police and the magis- trate need the space to establish the facts—not an easy thing to do when having to confront a griev- ing mother in such circumstances. The exercise of justice must be allowed to take its course, without fear or favour and with a lot of empathy. Wheth- er the case warrants prosecution is something the police and the magistrate will have to eventually decide. We trust their judgement to be fair and grounded in law. As for the mother, whatever the inquiry deter- mines, life has already passed its cruel judgement. She does not need our empty words to comprehend the tragedy that has befallen her family. What she needs right now is support and understanding. As for the rest of society, this incident is an in- dictment of our mad lives. A painful reminder of the need to slow down and to look out for one an- other; to show more empathy. No child has to die because of life's chaos and no parent has to pass through such a horrible tragedy. Quote of the Week "It is useless to boast about peace when your actions leave behind a great divide fuelled by racism, classism, misogyny, xenophobia and homophobia." – Nisa Laburisti indirectly criticising Deputy Prime Minister Ian Borg's nomination of Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. MaltaToday 10 years ago Emails show Farrugia met Claudio Grech to discuss LPG privatisation 11 October 2015 EMAILS published today reveal that Na- tional ist MP Claudio Grech had met oil trader George Farrugia, who turned State's evidence in the En emalta oil scandal, on more than one occasion before 2012. Earlier this week on Wednesday Grech, who be fore 2013 served in transport and infrastructure minister Austin Gatt's person- al secretariat, told the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee scrutinizing the Audi- tor General's audit into the prncurement of fuelat Enema Ita,that he had first met Farru- gia in 2012, when hedecided to run for the 2013general election. "If l met him [Farrugia] before 2012 then it definitely would have been something not worth recalling," Grech told the PAC, adding that the meeting "was requested by Farrugia himself and that he wanted to talk about the situation with his brothers." The discussion, Grech added, was "on gen- eral terms". But emails seen by MaltaToday clearly show that Grech had met Farrugia, a mem- ber of the family business John's Grnup, back in 2006. An email published today shows Farrugia in communication with his brother Ray saying: 'Need to C him (Claudio Grech) this week as I have some people coming re the LPG privatisaion on the 9, October." [...] To the keyboard warriors writing on social media from behind the comfort of their screen: Your judgement is not solicited—shut up!