The murder of the best investigative journalist has shaken Malta. Journalists there say they are still in danger
“Today we are in exactly the same place we were four, five years ago when Daphne was killed,” says Delia, in a small office in Leipzig, Germany.
The work of Caruana Galizia to expose blurred government agreements, suspicions of corruption and political intrigues has caught the imagination of most Maltese. Her daily online blog, Management Commentary, often gathered as many readers as Malta counted – some 400,000 a day. But her writing also earned her strong enemies.
Since her death, Delia’s work has focused on the accused who ordered and carried out her murder as she drove her car from the family’s rural home in the small village of Bidnija.
Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia assassinated. Credit: Dan Kitwood / Getty Images
Delia says he too has now become a target.
“I have been working on this story for about four years and it was a great time, but last summer I was under siege. I had my email accounts spoofed by weakening the stories I was working on and I allegedly confessed that I was a bit coo-coo, ”he says.
“My website was spoofed and that was a problem for my credibility. And then I started getting harassed phone calls, text messages, just a constant siege of pressure. ”
“The police were calling someone to pretend I was in the middle of the night, telling them ‘come quickly to my house because there’s someone here to kill me’. Obviously, full fiction, but meant for the police to knock on the door of my house, get up my children and tell them, ‘Where is your father? He said someone was trying to kill him. ‘”
Manuel installed CCTV cameras around his home and instructed his children to be aware of the conversations they had at school. But she did little to avoid harassment.
Manuel’s wife, who is also an activist, was abused and attacked in the sunlight on Malta’s busiest street while standing at the memorial site of the murdered journalist.
Delia was forced to flee Malta in October last year and was accepted into a fellowship program for troubled journalists run by the European Center for Freedom of the Press and Media in Leipzig. The program gave him relief from abuse in Malta, as well as a small stipend, training and therapy.
Daphne Caruana Galizia’s car wreckage after the explosion that killed her. Credit: STR / AFP via Getty Images
“See Malta is a country where a journalist was killed and ignoring this is silly. I can’t do that,Said Delia.
“I think there is an appreciation that journalists need cross-border help because they are dealing with cross-border issues.”
Threats against journalists in Europe have increased in recent years, with mafia-style hits carried out on Slovak journalist Jan Kuciak in 2018, Giorgos Karaivaz, who was shot in Athens in 2021, and Dutch crime journalist Peter R. de Vries, who was shot in the head in Amsterdam last year – among others[ra–fosto[rajn
Reporters Without Borders say about 20 Italian journalists live under permanent police protection, while in Bulgaria, journalists often face attacks and physical threats.
Journalists accused of being traitors
The country’s two main political parties – the ruling Labor Party and the opposition Nationalists – both have their own television networks, which stick to the party line and often attack. wildly opposition figures and disliked journalists. In a country with a long history of foreign occupation, there are strong narratives about betrayal and collaboration with the enemy. The word ‘traitor’ is often used on journalists who appear to be attacking the government or portraying the country as anything other than a sunny holiday destination.
Daphne Caruana Galizia’s sister, Corrine Vella, with Daphne Matthew’s son.
“Before I left Malta, Prime Minister Roberta Abela said that the kind of threats that Manuel Delia is taking are unacceptable and I have publicly appreciated that,” says Delia. “But I also said, Prime Minister, could you please bring your television station to stop talking about me as if I were a traitor, as if I were an unbelievable person.
“It’s not just about discrediting journalists, it’s about discrediting magistrates, investigators, police officers, Daphne’s family.”
“It simply came to our notice then. So if your credibility and dignity are undermined enough, there will be people who think they are going to be heroes if they hurt you. ”
But Delia says that her will remains strong and she is determined that she will continue Daphne’s work until her killers are behind bars. He urged the Maltese government to adopt the recommendations of a public inquiry last year which found the Maltese state ultimately responsible for leaving the conditions that led to its assassination. The findings called for institutional and judicial reform, more protection for journalists and greater barriers to mafia intrusion.
“I think if they fail to bring justice to Daphne in the case of her murder, she will send a message to future generations that a journalist could be killed here,” Delia said.
“And not only did nothing happen, but she was killed in vain, her job was in vain because, although she risked her life and lost it in the process of sharing the truth with us, this state simply did not move. I think it will be a moral crisis that we will never recover from. .
“The rest of the world will continue to think of us as a country that cannot or does not want to deal with corruption. And what he will also say is that they don’t care too much about us. “