Copyright timesofmalta
Forged in wartime and sealed over football games under fire, Martin Scicluna and Michael Rapinet’s friendship has lasted longer than the existence of the Soviet Union, over 80 years. They first met as young boarders at St Edward’s College during World War II, “a pretty grim school at the time,” as Rapinet recalls. Despite the bleak backdrop, the pair struck up a friendship that has lasted over eight decades. Rapinet, now based in the UK, recently returned to Malta to celebrate a joint milestone with Scicluna, as both marked their 90th birthdays. The lifelong friends sat down with Times of Malta to reflect on their journeys. The state of politics In later writings, Scicluna expressed praise of Muscat’s government, but this put him at odds with many of his own readers, including Daphne Caruana Galizia, leading to a public clash. Of Caruana Galizia, he said: “A wilful person. She hated anything which contradicted her own conception of what life in Malta should be like. She was also a great snob, which I didn’t like at all.” But he added that they had a “great correspondence” after one of his articles more than a decade ago. Despite the criticism, he insists he always tried to remain neutral. “I tried not to be partisan. All my training in life was not to be partisan,” he said. “I think our politics is unchanged, in the sense that there are still these two parties and they just cannot see eye to eye, even on things which should benefit Malta. And that I cannot understand,” he said.
