Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/176463
20 Opinion maltatoday, SUNDAY, 22 SEPTEMBER 2013 Put your marijuana where you L ast Wednesday, junior Justice Minister Owen Bonnici came out with some very impressive sound bites on the subject of his government's commitment to reform and expedite the justice system in Malta. Exaggerated delays in court procedures, he told us, are "completely unacceptable". "The current administration will not tolerate such situations at a time when the country is making a big effort to be among the best in Europe," he said. Sock it to them, Owen! Always nice to hear to some tough talk from a local justice minister. And quite rare, too. The last time I remember this happening was… ooh, let's see now… early 1990s, as I recall. The minister's name was Joe Fenech, and he very memorably gave the law courts around six months to "sort themselves out… OR ELSE". Fast-forward six months, and – surprise, surprise – not only did the situation at the lawcourts remain spectacularly unsorted-out, but it actually got considerably worse. I can't remember how long Fenech himself was kept on as justice minister after that, but… let's just say it wasn't forever, and move on. Raphael Vassallo But of course this won't happen to Owen Bonnici. Remember what we were all told before the last election? That Labour means business? That Labour always puts its money (actually, OUR money, but never mind) where its mouth is? That Labour is the real McCoy… the cat's whiskers… the dog's bollocks…. the bees' knees…. the best invention since disposable diapers, and all the rest of the modest epithets they have quietly appropriated over the years…? In a nutshell: Labour is a serious administration that always delivers on its promises. So when Owen Bonnici tells us with such stately deliberation that court YOUR FIRST CLICK OF THE DAY www.maltatoday.com.mt delays are simply unacceptable to his government… one assumes that his government will simply not accept them, end of story. At which point a rather conspicuous contradiction suddenly swims into view. Excuse me, Owen, but… your government IS accepting and tolerating this selfsame 'unacceptable situation' even as we speak. And much more beside: it is also aiding and abetting the same situation through its own actions (or lack thereof). Allow me to elaborate. For all your tough talk about ironing out the problems in the law-courts, the present government persists in obstinately and systematically failing to address the single most glaring root cause of these same delays… a cause which has time and again been identified (most recently by a Justice Reform Commission appointed by Owen Bonnici himself) as the everaccumulating backlog of criminal The police's 'war on drugs' starts looking suspiciously like a war on harmless little teenagers, while seriously dangerous crooks are free to run amok cases, some stretching back 30 years or more into the past. At present, there are around 14,000 cases pending before the criminal courts; and the number tends to increase at a far greater rate than older cases are actually concluded. At the speed with which the law-courts currently operate, it will take a minimum of eight years (by Owen's estimation) to reduce this backlog to zero even if no new cases were initiated in the meantime. And herein lies the rub. Practically every single day there is a new and very often unnecessary case that gets added to this list. This week, the police made five arrests over a 'suspected cannabis find' – which by the way raises a separate question, this time for the police: what do you mean, 'suspected'? It's either cannabis or it isn't. And if the police can't tell the difference between marijuana and marjoram, quite frankly they shouldn't be in the business of arresting anyone at all. Yet arrest people they do, on a regular basis… this time over a substance that may or may not have been cannabis; and the time before over no such drug find (real or 'suspected') at all. This latter case is perhaps worth revisiting, because it illustrates with graphic precision the ludicrous contradiction between the justice minister's commitment to reduce the existing case load, and the zeal with which the police force is making that selfsame Ingram t, Valletta Republic Stree urts next to the Co