TO BE OR NOT TO BE – is that the question?

Let me use myself as a case sample for these two delicate situations.

How would I react if I was accused of having received money (about €1 million) as payment for legal services from the owners of a London brothel in Soho and further accused of having stashed the money in a Channel Islands account?

How would I analyse that these accusations – purporting to be backed by publicised documents confirming these transactions – were made by a Blogger who was later regaled with a hall being named after her in the EU Parliament, a Blogger over whom a handful of people are clamouring for a monument to be built, a Blogger constantly featured by some quarters as being some kind of truth-seeking heroine?

How would I react in a further scenario if I were to be accused in a report in a popular newspaper of having been a dedicated cocaine user, of having held cocaine parties in which cocaine was trafficked and additionally accused of having misappropriated money through inflated accounts to pocket money from an EU system?

Let me assume that I was and am totally innocent of these accusations and that they are nothing more than a bunch of lies invented to ruin my reputation.

How would I react?

1. I would immediately contract the most proficient of lawyers to immediately initiate libel proceedings in order to establish my total innocence of these accusations;

1. To be even more judicious I would request the Law Courts to initiate Inquiries to prove the falsity of these accusations and totally establish my innocence.

On the other hand, what would I NOT DO?

1. I would certainly NOT just pooh, pooh these accusations and brush them off as being “fabrications” to harm my reputation;

1. I would certainly NOT stand in front of Law Courts and merely state that I have not actually been accused of anything;

1. I would certainly NOT laugh off these accusations and state they are of no importance and best ignored;

1. I would certainly NOT continue doing the rounds and pronouncing every Tom, Dick and Harry that I do not agree with to be corrupt and making money on the side;

1. I would certainly NOT, under any circumstances, try and throw negative reflections on the Judicial System and the Rule of Law as a means of distracting attention from the real issues that I am facing.

In the meanwhile, during all this non-action, these skeletons continue to rattle in my cupboard. They rattle and they roll and as nothing has been done to remove them, they will continue to rattle and roll.

BECAUSE, that is the question my dear friends – TO BE OR NOT TO BE – and it is a question that begs many, many answers.

ALBERT JEROME FENECH