Tag: elections

Categories
Campaign 2017

La elección nos absolverá.

 

For a fleeting moment, during a run up to an election and even after its inevitable aftermath, the nationalist party (and the wider coalition that had been formed) had seemed to be the best option to fight corruption and begin the much needed process of constitutional change. We were conscious that this was a work in progress. The gamble on Simon Busuttil’s PN and Marlene Farrugia’s PD was in many ways dictated by circumstance. Other advocates for change were not convinced even by this coalition. They expected, rightly or wrongly, an even greater change than a party that seemed to be led by a leader who seemed to have had a last minute damascene vision and another leader who seemed (in their opinion) to have turned one time too many. In the fog of “war” that is an electoral campaign we had not time to count these losses – though their opinion and vote was important: they too, after all want the real change.

Winners, they say, write history and the losers of elections are condemned to confused assessments and the interpretation of garbled information. The new parliament got a confused PD partner sending the wrong messages to anybody who had hoped that the coalition would serve its purposes. Marlene Farrugia, having made history as the first representative of a third party to be elected to parliament for a very long time, segued into a rosary of mixed messages that betrayed a lack of identity, a loss of sense of purpose and – to a large extent – showed her up as unable to use the tools of democracy in order to achieve her purpose.

The Nationalist Party meanwhile was in absolute meltdown. The crisis of identity that had been forced upon it by Simon Busuttil’s new switch for change began to unfold. Did the party really want to go in that direction? Was change and the battle against corruption worth this “suffering”? That was the choice being faced by the hardcore nationalist voter. The nostalgia for the PN victories of the past was misread as the need to revert to being the PN of the past – the one that thrives on the partisan structure that has been tattoed into our constitution. They nostalgia is for the banner, the hymn, the religio et patria but not for the most crucial element that had allowed the coalition of ideas that the PN has always been to be successful. What element is that? The ability to be on the right side of history, the ability to decide for the future and for future generations, the ability to be a party with a goal, a party with a soul.

That element was too hard to grasp. Especially after the second successive electoral loss. The PN core wanted an easy way out. It’s easy to see why. The reasoning is in competitive terms – not value oriented. In the days of post-truth politics values count much less than results. These are the days when an election will wipe accountability away with one fell swoop. Caught red-handed with accounts in Panama? Not fit for purpose? We’ll let the people decide, and a landslide victory later means that you are absolved of all crimes and free from any suspicion of corruption. A história me absolverá? Scratch that Fidel, our modern politicians cannot wait for history, it’s more like la elección me absolverá. The obsession with victory for victory’s sake – as they had been groomed to expect over years of partisan evolution meant that they would bay for a hopeful who would bring back those days of relativism, cynical pragmatism and yes, why not, employ some of the winning tactics that until now seem to have been the domain of the Labour party.

Delia is a godsend to the PN core. He takes offence when he is told that he risks making the PN look like a Labour clone. He misunderstands the why and how of that accusation. It is not because he has any secret plan of conniving and confabulating with Muscat and the Panama crowd. It is because the so called New Way is a choice to revert to the ever so familiar PLPN style of politics that has gotten us into the mess where we are. It is because his election is a clear message that the PN has abdicated from the real cause for change that is needed. Of course there is no harm in that for the PN core. They never stood for national aspirations. They stand for the preservation of the party. For its supposed rise from the ashes and return to running the country in that damned alternation with the other side of the partisan farce.

Where does that leave us? After yesterday’s step backwards we revert to being the minority of minorities, the unrepresented few who strive against all odds to force a mental shift upon a nation. Today we have less faith in the ability of fellow citizens to make choices weighed upon a better future. Today, a solution to the problem and to the need for change seems further than ever. We cannot be part of this PN. Not without a clear commitment to the change – constitutional and moral – that is needed.

Right now the only solution seems to be some future crisis that forces change as an inevitable option. It is sad to have come to this point but in many ways, and if we are to respect the democratic nature of our system, it is the only way in which the partisan elements upon which the real establishment feeds will open their eyes and notice the dangerous tightrope walk they have chosen to engage with.

This blog returns to the place it has always been: a voice for the unrepresented few who still yearn for change and reform.

The truth, if I lie.

Categories
Politics

The change we need and how to vote it in

 

I am not a nationalist

I am not a nationalist. The very idea of being a partisan card-carrying member of a party nauseates me and I feel insulted whenever I am told by anyone that I am a “nationalist”. This blog, created in 2005 has always been a strong promoter of constitutional change. Whenever I have written, whether on J’accuse or The Sunday Times or the Malta Independent on Sunday, I have taken this philosophy with me: it has come dangerously close to a creed. The analysis is simple really – our constitutional structure has been hijacked by a two-party system, it no longer serves the people who should be the ultimate depositories of sovereign power but it serves as a structure that enables to well-oiled grease machines that serve a “career” system entrenched in a not too fine system of networks. My belief: that system needs to change.

To change that system, to really change that system, we need a blanket reform – as we say in Maltese “bl-gheruq u x-xniexel”. That change means bringing down the whole palace including the two behemoths that have striven to set it all up. Yes, a real commitment for change by any of the two main parties would be a sort of hara-kiri in many ways. A party proposing this kind of real change would consciously be subscribing to its demise while preparing to start over in the new system with new rules. That is why it is difficult to trust any one of the two parties promising change – and this in a the sanitised world of the hypothetical, not counting the contexts and realities within which we vote every time we are called to the polls.

The biggest challenge the sovereign people have had every election, particularly since deciding on European Union membership has been whether to adhere to the Gattopardian motto (If we want everything to change then everything must remain the same) as represented by the status quo or whether to push the main parties off the edge and provoke a constitutional shift for the future. The people have not been sufficiently convinced to let go of old habits. The card carrying partisans have always won the day. The race to the bottom was allowed to happen. That is where we stand today.

Corruption, Maladministration, Bad governance

I am not independent. I don’t think anyone can really be independent – whatever that word means in political discourse of today. The notion of “independent” in local discourse falls part of the cobweb infested partisan way of thinking that for a few years managed to create the myth of “super partes” – persons who were supposedly allowed to play and comment in the political arena without having their motives questioned. The whole point of accusing people of claiming to be independent today rises out of some confused attempt at trying to identify which of the two parties they are trying to back. The level of political discourse is such that people are unable to participate in discussions based on clear cut values. Add to that the zero-sum nature of our voting system and you can barely blame anyone for sticking their flag to a mast rather than arguing the nuances of policies with which they may agree or disagree.

This election has very high stakes though. Coming as it does in the age of post-truth, it is becoming much more difficult to decipher on the ground yet when one takes a step back and looks at the wider picture one finds a perfect opportunity to trigger off the much needed change that I spoke about earlier. The system is shaking at its foundations. If you want to follow a partisan narrative you will end up comparing and justifying different levels of corruption. You will still end up discussing the social and economic future of our nation in very shaky terms unless of course you are on the side of the believers of Newspeak. Marie Briguglio’s brilliant analysis of the steroid-driven economy really drove the message home insofar as this particular point is concerned. No party is really thinking about the long term sustainable future of the country – just look at transport and think of the difference between promising what people want and what the country needs. The parties’ electoral manifesto is in both cases a dangerous mix of promising the earth to everyone and everything.

Which is why this election you have to ignore their manifestos. Yes. You read that right. Ignore the manifestos. The manifestos are just the Wizard’s Big Curtain behind which, for the most part, lie small parties with small ideas. At least most of their ideas for the nation are small – meanwhile the candidates will be vying for the greasy pole: a place in parliament, a parliamentary secretariat, a chairmanship, a ministry…  If any of these manifestos were to be implemented within the current institutional framework then we will have failed. I say we as a country because whenever we allow whatever party it is to operate within a system that guarantees absolute power to the party in government with a hold on all other institutions then we fail. The signs are more evident now because of Muscat’s team’s gargantuan effort at exposing them to everyone.

Up your manifestos

Yes. Ignore those manifestos with tunnels to Gozo, slashed taxes, trains, racecourses, freebies, jeebies and heebies. The manifestos are a useless waste of paper this time round. The ONLY promise that counts is the one regarding change. Which brings me back to the original point. I make it not as a nationalist, an independent or as one who voted AD for the last few elections. I make it as a person who believes that we might already be too late to bring about this change but that it is still worth one massive try. I also make it as an expat of thirteen years, with a comfortable salary and great job who needs ask nothing of my country (and who never needed ask anything of any party) if that counts for anything in your appreciation. I make it with a genuine interest in getting a better future for the country I was born in, the one I love to love and hate.

Change. It is all written into the much maligned coalition/non-coalition agreement/non-agreement between PN and PD. It is the one promise to which I am attaching my hopes in this election. It is the one promise which I will hold each and every member of a new government answerable for. Radical constitutional reform. It is hard to trust the nationalist party on this one. I know that because I have been there before. Once in power the temptation to retain the status quo will be strong as usual. As I said, commitment to real change means radical change both for party and for the country’s institutions. Which is why there will always be opposition from those used to the past ways of operation. Which is also why the struggle will not end on June 3rd.

THE JUNE THIRD REVOLUTION

On June 3rd the struggle begins. First, with a vote for the coalition promising change we will set the wheels in motion. Then it is the duty of each and every person who has stood up to be counted to bring about this change  to pressure the new government to start that wave of change. It has to start yesterday. No dragging of feet, no excuses. The political parties have been allowed to play Politics for too long with the wrong results. It is time for politics to return at the service of the people.

On June 3rd my number 1 vote will go for the PD candidate in my district. I chose the PD candidate because they are our Trojan horse to bringing about this change. By accepting the difficult conditions of a coalition with terms dictated by the current electoral laws they were prepared to sacrifice the party for the good of the country.  I will continue on the nationalist and alternattiva candidates. I have never in my life been convinced by the Labour party to give even a fraction  of my vote to them. I will surely not start this time round having seen the Labour party machine put in motion to defend the indefensible.

CLOSING

One final note. It has been 12 years of blogging but there are still people out there who think I write anonymously. So here goes. My name is Jacques Rene’ Zammit, I am a Gozitan lawyer specialised in European Union law and I work as a referendaire (which means I assist a judge to draft judgements) at the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg. I have been involved in politics for over 25 years, my first political “intervention” was a speech in the run up to the 1992 election. It was at a PN event at the Crystal Palace in Marsalforn and i spoke about the need of organisations in Gozo getting together to pull the same rope. At University I was a member of SDM during the time when a group of idealists in the organisation tried to cut off all ties from the Nationalist Party. That particular experiment was a partial failure – partisan ties are hard to break.

Among my credible adversaries at the time were Mike Briguglio and James Debono. I am glad to see that our generation produced free thinkers who believe in the country and believe in the future. I am honoured to be on the same wavelength as these two gentlemen and comforted by the idea that there are more of us out there – ready to stand up and be counted and constantly working for change.

This has been J’accuse telling you how I will vote on Saturday. I cannot sufficiently stress the importance that voters look at the country’s future before and above anything else. The future is not the cash in your wallet or the bills in your postbox, the future is the quality of your life, the social and the cultural, the possibility of living in a normal country where everyone is equal under the law, where we are all servants of the law so that we may be free. Good luck, we need it.

 

 

Categories
Constitutional Development

Il Triangolo No

triangolo_akkuza

 

I. Stability is a partisan word

Third parties, third ways. An online poll conducted by the paper Illum showed, among other things, that 14% of respondents would vote for a new party since they have no more faith in either the PN or the PL. Talk about a possible third way being a panacea for our political representation problems has belatedly gathered momentum on the island. Muscat’s government is on rapid implosion mode while the general feeling is that the PN alternative would generate more of the same style of politics – one that is deeply enmeshed in corruption and deceit to the detriment of the citizen. Marlene Farrugia’s rumblings as a dissenting politician within parliament are much stronger and coherent than those we have heard until now during the last months of the Gonzi executive. Add to that the fact that scandal after scandal the tempo of public discontent does not seem to subside and a few “public personae” are prepared to throw their weight into the ring and you have the recipe of what is being touted as the panacea for all this evil feeling: a third party.

Regular readers if this blog may well recall that the “Third Way” solution has long been advocated over the whole stretch of our blogging history. Often the election of a third party’s representatives in parliament has been described here as “driving a wedge in the bipartisan hegemony”. I still believe that a third party (and fourth and fifth) can have positive effects on our political system. The problem however lies elsewhere since the third party is not a solution in itself but it is actually a possible result of the solution that is necessary in order to definitely improve the state of our politics and consequently the health of our nation.

What do I mean? Let’s take a look at the PLPN reaction to the very public rumblings of a possible third party. Their rare chorus of unanimous disapproval was to be expected. More parties in parliament would cause “instability” they claimed. Worse still they could not envisage having to share the burden of government with some coalition party – anathema.

The PN might be investing in the concept of good governance but the philosophy behind the driving forces of this rekindling of values stops short of contemplating an utter reform of our representative system that might not be two-party-centric. Of course we can have good governance they will tell you, but applied to our system of alternation – and not beyond. In other words the current set of rules should be good enough for Busuttil’s new party philosophy – we only have to ensure that the tenets of good governance are properly applied therein and all will be fine. I beg to differ.

II. Self-preservation is a natural instinct

Let us use a coding metaphor. The structure of our constitutional system has been built using a language that reasons in bi-partisan terms. A bi-party rationale is written directly into the building blocks of our political system – both legally and politically. Since 1964 the constitutional and electoral elements of our political system have been consolidated in such a manner as to only make sense when two parties are contemplated – one as government and one as the opposition.

We are wired to think of this as being a situation of normality. The two political parties are constructed around such a system – we have repeated this over the last ten years in this blog – and this results in the infamous “race to mediocrity” because standards are progressively lowered when all you have to do is simply be more attractive than the alternative. The effect of this system is an erosion of what political parties is all about.

The political parties operating within this system are destined to become intellectually lazy and a vacuum of value. The intricate structure of networks and dependencies required to sustain the system negates any possibility of objective creation of value-driven politics with the latter being replaced by interest-driven mechanisms gravitating around the alternating power structure. Within the parties armies of clone “politicians” are generated repeating the same nonsense that originates at the party source. Meaningless drivel replaces debate and this is endorsed by party faithfuls with a superficial nod towards “issues”.

The whole structure is geared for parties to operate that way. Once in parliament the constitutional division of labour comes into play – posts are filled according to party requirements and even the most independent of authorities is tainted by this power struggle of sorts. Muscat’s team promised Meritocracy and we all saw what that resulted in once the votes were counted. In a way it was inevitable that this would happen because many promises needed to be fulfilled – promises that are a direct result of how the system works. With all the goodwill in the world Busuttil’s team promising Good Governance will be placed in the same position with the same rules as Muscat’s and Gonzi’s before them.

The point is that the system needs to be rebooted. Even a third party elected under these parameters would do little to shake the system at its foundations. What needs to be targeted are the laws and structures that have developed into an intricate network of power-mongering and twisted all sense of representative politics. A third party might be the result of that change of system but what is needed right now is that one (or both) of the two parties enjoying the uncanny and undemocratic advantages of their home-made rules is forced to accepting a program of constitutional change.

III – Restoring the supremacy of parliament

Malta’s constitution owes much to the concept of parliamentary sovereignty. Constitutionally political parties did not count for much. When forming a government the Head of State was invited to choose from among the members of parliament that member who enjoyed the support of the majority of members elected. No mention of parties. It is only through a series of shenanigans and legal changes to electoral laws that the parties became the be-all and end-all of the electoral process. Laws were changed to ensure majorities, seats in parliament and quotas – all in relation to the bi-partisan system. It led us to the infamous wasted vote.

The problem was not so much the theoretical guarantee of stability afforded by a bi-partisan system. No, the problem lay in how the guarantees afforded by alternation gradually became a threat to the “political” nature of the parties themselves. Instead they were replaced by careerist powermongers eager to climb up the ladder of our home-grown system of power-broking: from candidate to backbench MP to Secretary to Minister. Fiefdoms developed and by taking advantage of a system that guaranteed their presence on authorities, boards and watchdogs the constitution would play second-fiddle to the needs of the party in power while the opposition barked and whinged waiting their turn for a piece of the action.

How does this change? it changes by changing the whole system starting from its building blocks. Parliament has to be strengthened and revalued as the supreme guardian of constitutional representation. The new system should ensure that politicians elected to parliament fulfil their role of representatives of the people by acting as proper legislators and competent watchdogs on the operation of the executive that must remain subservient to their will. In order to obtain this we must wean parliamentarians away from the ladder of power as currently perceived while strengthening their role and function.

I have already put forward the four points that should be the groundwork for such a reform:

  1. The removal of districts from national elections.
  2. The introduction of party lists elected on the basis of proportional representation into parliament (with a minimum threshold of between 5% and 7%).
  3. The introduction of technical ministries with ministers chosen from outside parliament but accountable to parliament.
  4. (A corollary of 3) MP’s who become ministers should resign their place in parliament.

As I said in an earlier post this would remove the idea of careerist politicians. By clearly differentiating between the roles of the executive and the legislative/representative aspects we would ensure that parties are rewired to become effective in both. A technical executive with a proper plan and project will be one side of the coin while a strong representative body acting on behalf of the people monitoring and endorsing the work of the executive would be the other. Such parliaments could afford to have a hundred Marlene Farrugia’s who do not bow to a party whip for the party’s sake but use their vote in the best interests of those who elected them to parliament.

Conclusion

Electing a third party for the sake of electing a third party and simply out of spite to the two main parties is not a solution as things stand. This blog would advocate for stronger pressure on the party that is most willing to take up this programme of groundbreaking constitutional reform with the express understanding that should it get elected this would be its top priority. That mandate would end once the reform is achieved and new elections based on the new parameters would be held. What Malta needs is a Reform Movement that picks on the current momentum that is not endemic to Malta. What it certainly does not need is more parties playing from the same score as we have till now.

Categories
Mediawatch Rubriques

I.M. Jack – the pauline edition

imjack

Gone fishing or the Public Accounts Committee

I caught a glimpse of the proceedings at the Public Accounts Committee sessions. Inelegant and clumsy are the first words that come to mind. It was never meant to be a fashion statement or synchronised swimming, sure, but the overall impression before getting down to the nitty gritty is that of yet another debasement of institutional tradition.

Sitting in the metaphorical witness dock former PM Lawrence Gonzi had his patience tried by repeat questioning that seemed to be going nowhere. There was a moment of dramatic irony when Gonzi accused the Committee of not following the procedure it should (that of the COCP) when the Committee was actually chaired by (and therefore under the responsibility of) Jason Azzopardi of team PN.

Still, the line of questioning taken up by Justice Minister seems to be one of spurious fabrication very much in line with the journalistic style at MaltaToday (which revels in the idea of having kicked off this fracas in the first place) rather than the quest for some truth or other (in a land of multiple truths the first to the media machine is King). What exactly is the PAC after? What is this Enemalta business proving in the end?

In all probability this business, like surely many others to come, will prove that businesses, businessmen and corrupt persons in power (and by this I mean persons appointed to manage/run/sit on parastatal entities) will constantly try to find a convergence point in the shadows and suck from the public funds so long as they are not caught.

Amnesties and amnesia

It was also very interesting to watch the Justice Minister justify the line of questioning by claiming that the amnesty (proklama really) requires constant checking since one of the conditions it contains is that it can be withdrawn if the person enjoying its benefits is found to have hidden the truth.

So we have a “businessman” who is benefiting from an amnesty in order to assist the authorities in uncovering illicit activity by other “businessmen”. The current government’s line seems to be to question this amnesty (with the concurrent risk that many other people might end up not being brought to justice).

While all this is happening we have another sector (construction and development) in which the government seems to be adamant to offer a blanket amnesty to all those who have abused of the law (broken it) and partaken in the rape of the nation (metaphorically speaking). The Taghna Lkoll government has made no effort to hide its tight links to the Malta Developer’s Association and it’s erstwhile Chairman (or is he President?) Sandro Chetcuti.

There is no whistleblowing reason for an amnesty here. The feeble excuse that Taghna Lkoll philosophy can throw up (yes, like vomit) is that those paying for the amnesty will generate lots of money for the coffers. A blanket amnesty that allows people to buy scars on the face of the nation. Brilliant. So long as Sandro tells us that everything is just fine for the developers we must all be grateful.

Kulcha and Karnival

It may seem too facile an argument but the priorities of Taghna Lkoll in the field of culture are so obviously linked to core voting interests that you cannot but argue on the lines that sound both snobbish and classist. As the effort to denigrate the City Gate project continues to gather momentum we are told of the Great Carnival and Music set of stalls that will offset the great vacuum that exists. Minister Bonnici (him again) told the gathered press that we cannot continue with this “silo mentality” – I must confess I had to look it up since I am not a FEMA graduate and find marketing catchphrases particularly undigestible.

It turns out that fighting the “silo mentality” means copying the design of garages and stalls that some Taghna Lkoll-ing carnival float enthusiast (and ONE employee) had visited on a trip abroad and spending some 6 million euros to build a sort of samba-drone that doubles up as a garage band gig place much to the chagrin of William Mangion.

Is it facile to argue that the ditched plans for the ditch/moat are crying for re-instatement and could well have done with some of those millions? Is it too easy to argue that while we appreciate that the carnival custom in Malta does deserve an investment of sorts (inclusive of a papier-mache’ museum) this should not come as an easy-fix solution that is obviously lacking in global planning?

Personally I love the idea of a regenerated part of Marsa hosting a carnival drove complete with museums and apprentice schools. It is the way these ideas suddenly pop up and are so very evidently the result of “lapazzar” planning simply to shut the mouths of another cohort of voters that is absolutely obnoxious. Stilll. It’s better than those bastard nationalists who never listened eh?

They’re drowning again

Far from the offices of wake up and smell the coffee. Far from the populistic approaches and ISIS scaremongering. There, in the deep blue tempest toss’d seas, more and more of them are dying. On the eve of the day when Malta celebrates the feast of Saint Paul’s Shipwreck, tens of immigrants who had left Tripoli in the hope of a better future lost their lives to the sea and the cold. What value those lives to the thousands who will throng the streets of the city of gentlemen adulating the Magnus who like the immigrants had been toss’d by the same sea?

Lawyers and Lawyers

Two issues. First the hunting then the constitutional case where the PN seems to have regained two seats. We had a parade of practising and retired lawyers stating the obvious (and then even complicating matters in interviews by not getting it quite right) when it came to referenda and their consequences. Did we need that charade? It reminded me of that farce re-enacted by Alfred Sant pre-1996 when he sat down with the an accommodating notary to sign a “contract with the people” – blissfully ignorant that the whole business of election, swearing-in and governing already covered the job.

As for the constitutional case. There is a glaring silence on the PN side when it comes to arguing which seats should be compensated and why. I watched a lawyer called Adrian Delia perform logical summersaults on an interview with newsbook.com.mt. He was clearly confused by the question as to whether or not Labour should have lost two seats in the process. Let us set aside the absolute hypocrisy of a PN representative talking about proportional representation in parliament – the proportionality has nothing to do with it.

The two candidates Buttigieg and Azzopardi were deprived of their seats because of an error by the Electoral Commission when the original set of parliamentary seats was being distributed. Thus Azzopardi lost out to Justyne Caruana for the fifth seat in the 13th district. If the error is admitted and the proper count repristinated then it should automatically follow that Caruana would lose her seat and Azzopardi would take it up (ths giving a 3-2 result for PN in Gozo). Same applies for the Edward Scicluna – Claudette Buttigieg situation.

The compensation of seats for proportional purposes takes place AFTER the original election of 5 candidates from each district. It has nothing to do with the error that took place BEFORE the proportional attribution. The PN request before the Civil Court should technically have included the request to have the Labour candidates erroneously elected replaced with the nationalist candidates who had been “cheated” by the error.

Happy Saint Paul’s feast to all J’accuse readers. We are one month away from our 10th anniversary of this blog. Thank you for your custom.

Categories
Mediawatch Politics

Europe’s representation crisis?

representation_akkuzaThe upcoming French municipal elections have unearthed a huge problem. In many municipalities there is a dearth of candidates, particularly for the post of Mayor. In the Gironde area 45% of the smaller communes are still without a candidate – and it does not stop there. The main reason given for the dearth of candidates is the stricter set of rules being enforced among smaller communes when it comes to conditions for submitting candidatures and lists. There is another parallel reality though and that is related to the fact that potential candidates are shying away from what is perceived as a great responsibility.

In Italy, new PM Matteo Renzi has chosen to merge a swathe of administrative districts in Sicily in order to make them more competitive and promote development. The new “South-East District” encompasses Catania, Siracusa and Ragusa and is intended as an injection to the often static development in the south of Italy. Italy’s Senate and Parliament have had a little bomb explode within thanks to the earthquake that has shaken Grillo’s M5S.

Grillo’s 5 Star Movement has always found it hard to come to terms with an effective working representative system. In its effort to maximise transparent and representative decision making, the Movement ends up having draconian rules and emanates a sense of inflexibility. It could be a case of a far-fetched utopian reality attempting to adapt to the circumstances of old-style politics. Or it could simply be an implosion in the making.

Probably it is a bit of the two. What seems to surface from this kind of turmoil is the fact that a “new politics” without revolution rarely, if ever, happens. The M5S tried to glide into and replace the old system of political workings. This old system is a system that had settled comfortably into a market of power-mongering, influence trading and alternating hegemonies that had little or nothing to do with democratic representation.

Matteo Renzi has been accused of being the new face of the old style politics. He is the epitome of non-representative political methodology – not having been elected to parliament, senate or power. His is but one manifestation of the disenfranchisement of representative power. Another method would be the gradual removal of accountability, transparency and basic rule of law. The latter is a method preferred by the nouveau “representative majorities”, rushed into power by popular mandate which is all too soon discarded and replaced by the service of the power-mongering, influence trading and hegemonic elite.

Finally, the European Union itself, with the elections for its most representative branch just round the corner, would do well to take a long hard look at its long term objectives and if necessary question whether or not there exists a demos to be served and, more importantly, what that demos is calling for.

 

 

Categories
Mediawatch Politics

Luxembourg’s new coat

So the election came and went. Luxembourg’s that is. It came early – some unfathomable scandal to do with phone tapping and the sorts led to the precipitating of ballot consultations – and finished quickly. For southerners like myself who are used to elections being dealt with like some enormous football match complete with hooligan behaviour on the stands, Luxembourg’s national elections was an exercise in sanitised efficiency of the most yawn-inducing kind.

The elections were held on Sunday (yesterday) which also happened to be Mantelsonndag (literally Coat Sunday). Mantelsonndag is the day in which Luxembourgers go out and buy their new winter coat – which means that all the shops have another excuse to open on Sunday. Did this interfere with the fervour of the electoral consultation? Not one bit. Those entitled to vote (it’s less of an entitlement more of an obligation here – you HAVE to vote in Luxembourg) had six hours to go to their allocated booth and pick their candidates of choice in one of four districts (North, South, Centre and East). Polls opened at 8 a.m. and were shut by two in the afternoon, which means you could only just make it for the last order in a restaurant in the city.

With many more parties contesting the elections than in our notoriously bipartisan (+1) home nation you’d expect an interesting level of tension – to say the least. Nothing. At least not outwardly so. Not even the hundreds of billboards (in wood I noticed, très environmentally friendly) with the robotic expressionless faces were subjected to the least of political vandalism. Police on the roads? Are you kidding? People just rushed to the sales in the great shopping centres and forked out some money from Europe’s highest wage packets to update their ski gear and buy the new manteaux. Silence. The four (yes, four) Fiorentina supporters at the Italian joint where we get our weekly fix of calcio probably made the most noise in the whole of Luxembourg on Sunday – and their purple was not for the Pirate Party.

By seven in the evening results started to trickle out and they all but confirmed the predictions with the ruling CSV losing three of its seats in the Luxembourg 60-member parliament and the Greens losing another. The big winners were the Democratic Party who had caused what one of the papers (wort.lu) enthusiastically described as a “wave of blue” (plus four more seats in parliament). Led by the erstwhile Mayor of Luxembour Xavier Bettel the liberal-democrat party made some substantial gains that would give them a strong hand at the negotiating table as Jean-Claude Junker will form a new coalition government – extending his party’s (and his) stay in power beyond the current 18 year record.

The socialist party and left did not make any particular gains while a very interesting development occurred with the newly formed Pirate Party which managed to garner close to 3% of the vote on the first attempt. No seats in parliament for the swashbuckling heroes of liberty but the amount of votes they obtained guarantees them state financing for their next attempt (are you watching Malta?).

Thusly, without too much of a fuss and without any excessive drama, the Grand Duchy got its new coat. The multi-party politics formula seems to work  – and work well – for this tiny nation. Not for them the mass meetings and the carcades… the only time Luxembourg gets to see those is during a World or European cup… then again there’s no Luxembourgers in those carcades – just those noisy southern guests from Portugal, Italy or Greece.

Ah Europe, Unity in Diversity.