Prime Minister Joseph Muscat heaped praise on Sai Mizzi Laing for her work in attracting Chinese company Huawei to Malta in July 2015. “Malta and @Huawei sign agreement on R+D centre, #SafeCity, 4.5G in preparation for 5G, training of Maltese students,” Muscat tweeted. And signed off JM.
Last week, Malta’s Labour government announced that SafeCity is no more. Muscat’s and Sai Mizzi’s fabulous project will be dissolved. Another Muscat white elephant bites the dust – but not before flushing millions of taxpayers’ money down the drain or, rather, into some people’s pockets.
In typical Labour hyperbole, Muscat announced that a deal had been struck with Chinese technology giant Huawei. “This is the first major result of the decision made by my government to appoint Ms Mizzi Laing despite stiff criticism,” Muscat declared. He joked that, on hearing how much profit Huawei made annually, he thought to himself that Huawei could easily bail out Greece.
Huawei was meant to implement a controversial facial recognition CCTV system that would be launched in problem spots such as Paceville and Marsa but which would be rolled out throughout the country.
Muscat bragged that Huawei would set up a joint innovation centre to develop SafeCity solutions in Malta.
Muscat’s then parliamentary secretary, José Herrera added to the hype. He described the deal signed with Huawei as “a great achievement for the country”. He claimed the deal “will allow Malta to prosper… making citizens’ lives better”. Ominously, Huawei confirmed it would develop the innovation centre aimed to help “public administration react to threats”.
Herrera appointed Joseph Cuschieri, President George Vella’s son-in-law and Yorgen Fenech’s travelling partner, to work with Mizzi Laing on negotiations with Hua ..
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