Bafana, Bafana my backside. Portugal, Ivory Coast and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is the mantra I have been repeating ever since the nail-biting draw for next summer’s World Cup ended. Not even the radiant presence of South African beauty Charlize Theron and her tongue-in-cheek remarks about things best left unsaid (she’s talking about you Raymond “Bloody” Domenech!) could assuage my disappointment at the cruel, cruel draw that had just resulted in Brazil being placed in this edition’s group of death. Kaka’, Ronaldo and Diver Drogba will be vying for one of the two places to emerge from Group G – that is unless there is no 2010 version of 1966’s Pak Doo-Ik lurking in the shadows.
So while I resigned myself to the idea that it will be sufferance for me and my nails as from day one (15th June for me), I contemplated the cruel system of seedings, groupings and geographic divisions that separated the weak from the tough before you could say alea iacta est (the die has been cast). You see, even in matters as frivolous as sport (I cannot believe I am saying it), eight decades of trial and error have resulted in a neatly polished system of meritorious classification known as “seeding”. It allows FIFA to spread the ‘best’ teams into different groups and ensure that we do not end up with World Cup semi-finals featuring Switzerland, Slovakia, Honduras and New Zealand.
The commie in you might ask, “What is wrong with all the teams getting an equal chance in an FA cup sort of way? Doesn’t the system favour the bigger, better teams giving them a greater chance to get through to the final?” Well. Yes it does. And that’s because the system is designed to make sure that the winning team gets a fair chance to prove itself against teams of all kinds of calibre. Otherwise a lucky draw could result in the likes of New Zealand (I love them, I really do) marching all the way to the final simply by being drawn against weaker teams. The “fair chance” theory that is a natural reaction to the seeding-based kind of selection, as we witnessed in Cape Town this Friday, is a load of bollocks after all.
Just desserts (continued)
That is why, notwithstanding the fact that I am a hopeless old fashioned romantic when it comes to football, I still admit that the modern day Champions’ League is a thousand times more difficult to win than the good old Champion’s Cup. Whatever the fine details of the new format are, you can rest assured that the moment the world famous Champions’ League hymn is blasted on the tannoy and the cannons are shooting hundreds of black and white stars while Alessandro del Piero is lifting the trophy, the winning team will have played some of the best teams in the continent before getting to put its hands on the prize.
There are always criteria for choosing the best and most adapted person/team for a particular situation. In today’s world we tend to somehow set aside merit while we wallow in a watered-down concept of fairness and justice, where everybody deserves to be a minister/surgeon/chief justice/lawyer/teacher simply by wanting to be one. If we are not wallowing we are busy reading greed, avarice and gluttony in the action of every individual who strives to achieve more and aim higher.
In our tiny island microcosm it gets worse. Decades of PLPN rot have come to mean that concepts such as alternation and jobs for the boys are taken for granted. One would have hoped that the new European dimension would change that – especially with the meritocratic style of appointments that comes with most echelons of European Union employments. We had kicked off quite well and Mr Borg, our outgoing EU Commissioner, managed to garner the respect of his peers in Europe and build a deserved aura of respect for the post he filled so positively over five years.
Grapes and gripes
There were always the naysayers and sceptics. There were those who could only see the narrow-minded picture and quantify the value of jobs such as those of MEPs or Commissioners in terms of income earned and not of prestige, responsibility and commensurate remuneration. In the beginning it was the notorious “No” camp that imported the eurosceptic redundant argument regarding salaries and remuneration, as though the only reason to fill a post in the EU was the money in the bank at the end of the term. Nationalist spinmasters would call them jealous, greedy and ignorant on many an occasion. They were, in the minds of the Nationalists, base, badly bred idiots who did not appreciate the value of the political mission behind a post such as that of a Commissioner.
We thought we had matured beyond this level of ignorant, jealous exchange – particularly when the new head of the ever-suspecting Opposition returned from a Damascene trip of his own in the heart of Brussels. Even Labour had seen the light – and now we had hoped it was no longer a matter of base “gravy-train and nose-in-the-trough” harangues but real politics about who best would serve us in Europe. It WAS so. Until we heard that Lawrence Gonzi had chosen John Dalli and that Joe Borg was not too pleased about it. That was when the whole gravy train business was brought up again. That ignorant discourse related to base considerations of the monetary kind was back in the mainstream… and guess what base, stupid, badly bred accuser was slinging the mud this time round?
J’accuse had a pretty good blogging week thanks to what we termed Borg-gate. You’ll find most of it by logging onto the blog but I thought I’d provide you with the full thrust of Friday’s post rounding up a week of discussions examining the criteria that our Prime Minister had in mind when he opted for Mr Dalli as our new man in the Commission.
The criteria for the election of a Commissioner
First of all, notwithstanding any disquisitions to the contrary that anyone may hold, I am not the Prime Minister and I have not worked with either Joe Borg or John Dalli for any period of time. The closest I got to any of them was listening to Joe Borg’s Employment Law lectures, which, thanks to Richard England and the lovely lecture rooms he designed, did not mean much to me, as I could not hear a damn thing. J’accuse’s analysis on the choice of Commissioner and the motivations behind it is based on trying to understand what criteria the Prime Minister and this government use when choosing representatives abroad. What I think about whether Borg or Dalli is the better politician/ Commissioner is frankly as relevant as whether I think Ferrara should pick Amauri or Trezeguet to head the Juventus forwards.
I can tell you that, right now, I dislike Ferrara’s coaching methods – especially when it comes to formations and substitutions – but that, if you get the metaphor, is a judgement on Ferrara and not on Amauri or Trezeguet. So back to the choice of Commissioner. We had a series of events that led to the choice and a series of events after the choice that seemed, at least in our minds, to point to the fact that Lawrence Gonzi PM made his choice based on inconvenience above all other considerations.
I can understand readers like the ubiquitous Fausto when they insist on asking whether I would choose Dalli or Borg if the consideration were solely competence and I think I already answered that question. Borg has a proven track record and also carries the not too light advantage of having already won the respect of the Commission President, his peers and a big chunk of the Brussels politocracy – as well as the respect of the intricate part of the demos he dealt with over five years. Don’t take my word for it – take Patrick Tabone’s – a former employee of the man who only had words of praise for his sterling work and contribution in an open letter to Daphne that also features on J’accuse (see the post dated 4/12/09 and entitled “Borg-gate: Joe Borg Revisited”).
So yes, if there were no internecine warfare going on at Triq Herbert Ganado, I would have absolutely no doubt that Lawrence Gonzi would have confirmed Joe Borg. Instead we had to have what the Romans called the promoveatur ut amoveatur – promoting someone to get him out of the way. Yes, we are not inventing the wheel. Many other governments have done it before and it will be done again. There is no escaping the fact, however, that this choice, this time around, is based on inconvenience and not on other matters. Lawrence’s uncomfortable bedsharing with Dalli far outweighed the benefits of keeping on a respected Commissioner for another term.
The gravy train bouillabaisse
The second huge corollary of this event is that the war at Triq Herbert Ganado is now uncontrollable, messy and about to result into a lot of doo-doo spreading all over the sponsored painted walls of the spanking new Dar Centrali. The stupid (for there is no other word for it) and petty manner in which the whole “gravy train” business was dragged out as the basis of what has now become a standard character assassination exercise, is a clear demonstration how unity and consistency is the last thing on the PN agenda.
The castle was crumbling and “the RCC/Gonzi clan v the Dalli clan” debacle got messily uncontrollable. Joe Borg was an unfortunate sacrificial victim, and the moment he dared open his mouth to complain on the abrasive mishandling he became fair game for the usual set of guns.
No holds are barred at this point, and what is worse is that the immediate rage of the battlefield risks producing an infinite repertoire of quotable masterpieces, produced by persons short-sighted enough to not see the bigger and long-term consequences of their actions.
They had no qualms about denigrating the important positions within the EU structures – ignorantly linking “gravy train” politics to the likes of Joe Borg (and indirectly to the likes of anyone who will in the future hold the post of Commissioner – unless of course you fall for the ridiculous taunt of “proper breeding”). In their rush to get rid of the uncomfortable confessor, they sent John Dalli and most of his clan to Brussels. Even Saviour “Independent Journo” Balzan resigned from MaltaToday and is probably regrouping in Brussels as we type.
The PN futures (trouser-leg of time or just pants?)
Dalli’s exile might bode well for the Gonzi clan for the time being but just press on the fast forward button for a moment. Five years down the line, a duly satiated Dalli could be posed to return to the scene and pick up the shambles of a possibly wrecked PN. Does that still sound like good news to the Gonzi clan? I would not know. I cannot even be sure whether the PN loss at the next election is guaranteed – not with Joseph Muscat’s current levels of performance.
The bright side to all this is that an angry Joe Borg could bide his time and bring back some of his expertise to the fold. Is it too late for that? Will the PN as it is currently geared prove a fertile field for an ex-Commissioner, who is probably brimming with fresh ideas from the continent? We have good reason to doubt that there will be a welcoming crowd for that kind of internal change. The PN machinery is currently oiled on value-less cutthroat competition clumsily serviced by masters of spin and hopeless planning. It is very possible that Joe Borg is perceived as a threat and not a bonus (always assuming that Borg even feels like re-entering the fray).
All in all it’s been a messy choice. The dithering and dragging on until it was made did not bode well. The perceived criteria according to which the choice was made are also not encouraging. The messy circus on and around the final designation of Commissioner capped by the ridiculous spinmeister frenzy was frankly such an embarrassment to the party that the sooner it is forgotten the better.
Saint Nick
Saint Nicholas’ day is round the corner in the parts of the world where this column is written. Nicholas (and his erstwhile companion Zwart (Black) Peter) is responsible for the instilling of a culture of merit among children around the world. The children who have behaved and spent a relatively diligent and good year receive their reward. For those who have been naughty, a block of coal. Short of receiving a lemon, charcoal should do as a palliative for soothing stomach problems caused to those who have not quite made the cut this year. I hope I do not need to stock up on some come next June!
This has been J’accuse blogging from very rainy Luxembourg. Bertu asks me to say hi to all his fellow tangueiri (and no, it’s not women in lewd poses wearing all-revealing tangas). Log on to http://www.akkuza.com to get the full picture (and again I am not referring to the aforementioned women). Have a good one!
This article and accompanying Bertoon were published in today’s edition of The Malta Independent.
