Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/329964
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 15 JUNE 2014 20 Letters Send your letters to: The Editor, MaltaToday, MediaToday Ltd. Vjal ir-Rihan, San Gwann SGN 9016 | Fax: (356) 21 385075 E-mail: newsroom@mediatoday.com.mt. Letters to the Editor should be concise. No pen names are accepted. The people have spoken. Analyses of the results revolve mainly on the different interpretations being given to the increased votes cast in favour of Arnold Cassola and Alternattiva Demokratika. The people returned a verdict that lowered the votes of the two major political parties in finite terms, Labour by 14,000 votes and the Nationalist party by 44,000 votes, when compared with the last general election. The PN registered its worst electoral performance since 1953! The Labour party, albeit winning the election, failed to achieve the absolute majority of votes. This result does not guarantee Labour success in four years time. Labour did however manage to get its voters out to vote. There was, however, certainly no shift to Labour. Why did a substantial number of voters vote AD? Was it a protest vote? Was it a political statement against the dominant two party system? Was it a vote against the restructuring policy of the Govern- ment? What can be said with cer- tainty is that many traditional voters of both parties and most especially those of the Nationalist Party did vote AD. The interpretation being given by the Nationalist party is that AD vot- ers are in fact Nationalists protest- ing against their Government as a result of the pain and anxiety being caused by government's restructur- ing programme. The corollary of such an argument being that, like night follows day, the protestors will return to their natural home come the next general election. In the meantime, Lawrence Gonzi asserts that is 'it is business as usual.' The Nationalist Party must be very careful of this line of think- ing. They may be reading the mes- sage sent by the electorate wrongly. An analysis of the vote requires deeper thought. The vote first of all confirms, yet again, that with the passage of each election the number of floating voters is increasing. This symbolises a maturing elector- ate less willing to vote in a strictly traditional tribal manner. It is the first genuine crack in the two-party dominant edifice. Last Thursday's editorial in In- Nazzjon stated that many of the AD votes were not transferred to one of the two political parties as voters stopped after expressing their preference for Cassola. This view is in clear contrast with the opinion of the Prime Minis- ter that a very high percentage of Cassola's votes carried on to the Nationalist party. It will never be possible with certainty to identify where the second preference votes of AD went. As expected, the blame game has started and Alternattiva is blaming the Nationalists for Cassola not be- ing elected since Nationalists voted in accordance with the wishes of their Leader who advised them to vote only for the eight Nationalist candidates. The PN, on its part, blames protest voters for electing a Labour candidate as they should have given their first preference to a Nationalist candidate. The fact remains that a candi- date winning 23,000 votes was not elected and this is a clear indictment of our electoral system. Persons who voted for Cassola are right to feel short-changed by the system and AD now have a clear moral case for electoral reform. Many a voter is feeling disen- franchised, after all it is clear that Cassola should have been and could have been the fifth elected candidate. This election should serve as a catalyst to initiate a further round of discussion among the political parties to fine-tune the electoral law. An equitable solution must be found whereby all votes cast are fully represented. Within the Nationalist Party there is the need for much soul searching. Many of the AD votes must have originated from the liberal wing of the party that feels un-represented in the Nationalist Party's higher echelons. Too often one hears traditional PN voters from the more comfortable sectors of society lamenting that this is no longer their party. It is no longer the party they knew. This lack of connection between the party and the middle class needs to be addressed urgently. It is the middle and upper-middle class that have been the traditional backbone of the PN. Losing this sector would spell electoral disaster for the Party. Lawrence Gonzi should make this his top priority. Historical moment Malta's sixth seat in the 2009 election,comes too late for Arnold Cassola. With six seats, the quota would have come down to 34,000 from 41,000, still a long way for Profs Cassola but close enough for comfort. Had it been a certainty before the European elections the sixth seat would have given Lawrence Gonzi some mileage. The conclusion of cohesion funds for our Island state is very good news too. Nevertheless, the fledgling premier merits a well done for these two specific achieve- ments. The Brussels meetings brought together all heads of state. Dr Gonzi, accompanied by his foreign minister John Dalli and the permanent rep- resentative to the commission, Mr Richard Cachia Caruana agreed to the final wording of the Constitu- tion. The historical implications of this Constitution should not be underestimated. It will take some time before the subtle federalism of Europe digs in despite the reluc- tance of Britain and other member countries. Where would we be today if Malta had missed the boat and remained out of this European experience? Reconnecting with the middle class Editorial • June 20 2004 Resignation of Peter Grima I write on behalf of Ing. Peter Grima and refer to the report in the MaltaToday ('Enemalta Chief Officer resigns amid allegations of de- railed NAO audit', 8 June 2014) and the allega- tions made in the said article against my client. My client Peter Grima unreservedly denies the allegation that he, at any time, misrep- resented the facts to the NAO or in any way attempted to mislead them in their enquiry. All the replies given to the NAO in their 2012 questionnaire were based on information that was available to Enemalta and my client at the time. My client further denies that he was inter- viewed by Enemalta in connection with the replies to the NAO investigation in 2012 or that he was ever made aware that he was under investigation in connection with the replies fur- nished to the NAO and has to date neither seen the internal Enemalta report, which is appar- ently the basis for this article, nor has he been requested to explain any of the replies given to the NAO questionnaire in July 2012. Moreover his resignation from Enemalta took place over a month after he had accepted a secondment with the Ministry for Energy, where he has been working since the beginning of May, and the terms of his resignation were mutually agreed with Enemalta. My client reiterates that the information provided to the NAO was based on the infor- mation available to Enemalta at the time (up to July 2012) and there was evidently no intention on his part to in any way or manner derail the NAO investigation. Furthermore, at no time was there any attempt made to downplay the possibility of meter tampering. The smart meters and the automatic meter- ing system used by Enemalta were procured from IBM and ENEL after a competitive call for tenders in 2009, and the smart meters were equipped with security features and anti- tampering devices which were believed to make them resilient to tampering. These numerous features were described in detail to the NAO by my client and it was obvi- ously underlined that these protection features were only operational once the meter has been installed at the consumer's end and commu- nicating with the central meter management system. The anti-tampering philosophy was designed to rely both on hardware protection and data analytics, which would be carried out on the consumption data sent by the meter to the meter management and billing system. Un- fortunately however, in July 2012 only a small percentage of the installed meters were com- municating with the meter management and billing system and hence for the majority of the smart meters installed the main protection was based on hardware and meter sealing. It is pertinent to note here that my client was only responsible for the Enemalta distribution section, including the meter section, until June 2012, after which, following an internal reor- ganisation, he no longer held the responsibility. The NAO was also provided with all the details of the efforts undertaken by Enemalta, in conjunction with IBM and ENEL, to develop countermeasures against potential tampering. In fact by July 2012, important advances had been made but my client was no longer involved in their implementation following the reorgani- sation process previously referred to. The recent cases of meter tampering discovered in 2013 rely on the use of inside knowledge by Enemalta employees in carrying out the work by opening the meters, physically tampering with the components, then closing them back up whilst hiding any traces. This is something that was not believed possible in 2012, at least not without breaking the case, as these were believed to be factory sealed. In fact when the first tampered meters were recently sent to ENEL for investigations, it was reported that ENEL could not believe that the meters had been opened without leaving any visible traces. It is a known fact that the fight against meter fraud is a continuous battle, and for every means of fraud detected and countered, new means for fraud will be developed, implying that continuous monitoring would be neces- sary. This is one of the reasons why Enemalta embarked on the Smart Meter project as once the meters were installed and communicating, Enemalta would have had all the data necessary to be able to identify such cases of fraud. It is however not true, as alleged, that there were no inspections carried out in 2012. There were inspections both on smart meter instal- lations and on other older meter installations; both by inspection teams from the meter sec- tion and by an inspection team operating out of the customer care section. Furthermore there were plans to set up a dedicated revenue protection team with staff trained in the use of the data analytics soft- ware, which was to be developed with IBM. Thus, the conclusion reached by the NAO, that with an adequate and continuous 'detect and inspect' approach the phenomenon of me- ter fraud could be controlled, was a reasonable and valid conclusion. After June 2012 however, my client reiter- ates that he no longer held the responsibility to ensure the implementation of such an approach following the internal reorganisation men- tioned earlier. Damien Degiorgio Fenech Farrugia Fiott Legal Christians have lately been com- plaining a lot about being persecut- ed. Perhaps now, after persecuting others for centuries on end, they're finally beginning to understand what it means to be persecuted. They're paying the price for the sins and crimes committed by their Christian forbears. It's "dangerous to be Christian," moaned Neville Kyrke-Smith in the media on 8 May. May I remind him that, thanks to Christians like himself, it was once dangerous to be a pagan, a Jew, a 'heretic', a 'witch', or even to be someone who simply followed the dictates of his own 'conscience'. Christian prelates residing in Israel recently complained about graffiti daubed on their property by Jewish extremists. These graffiti on walls are harmless pranks compared to the relentless and vicious persecution of Jews by Christians from the 4th century onwards. Jews were the scapegoats of Chris- tendom. Whenever something went wrong – from poisoned wells to the Black– Christians always blamed the Jews, and then proceeded to perse- cute them without mercy. Before Christians complain about being persecuted, they should read about the injustices and the hard- ships that the Jews suffered after they were expelled from Catholic Spain and Portugal. They should keep in mind the horrific massacres of Jews by fellow Christians in Germany during the First Crusade. They should peruse the long, sad history of persecution by Christians of non-Christians and fellow Chris- tians alike. John Guillaumier St Julian's Complaints about persecution