Tag: GonziPN

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Campaign 2013 Politics

The charm offensive ?

So Simon Busuttil, il-wiċċ taz-zokkor, is now officially deputy leader of the nationalist party. The last person to really care so much about the post of deputy leader must have been Guido De Marco (bless his soul) and probably that was because the post meant so much to him in terms of the position that he never obtained – that of leader of the party and prime minister of a nation. De Marco was a giant figure in Maltese politics and his political career outshone whatever disappointments he may have felt with regard to the failure to become Prime Minister – if anything Guido gave added value to the post of deputy leader.

Let’s face it. How often have we even taken any notice of the nationalist party’s deputy leader and his role within the party? Before all the hullabaloo of the Busuttil vs Fenech contest can you really honestly say that anybody anywhere gave two hoots about who sat at the right hand of Lawrence Gonzi? Look at Labour, they had a sort of big deal about their triumvirate until the two deputies became too embarrassing to flaunt and they too were relegated to token appearances. But back to the PN. The post of deputy leader was as effective as that of receptionist at Dar Centrali. In the past the PN has been all about Leader, Secretary-General and a distant third would be the President of the Party. But deputy leader? Who?

But now we have Simon. And it behoves the nationalist party’s poll ratings that Simon’s ascendancy to the deputy leadership becomes the greatest deal this Christmas. If necessary, he’s got to be bigger than Santa Claus. Jesus even (with apologies to the Beatles).

Fresh Sweep

The election for the post had been billed, for good reason, as a battle between old and new. Simon banked on the idea of change while  Tonio backed by the old guard and all the cabinet but one was the symbol of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. The glossators of the PN school of thought tried to play down this dichotomy but no amount of dampening could hide the fact that this was just that – old guard vs fresh babyface.

Not that Busuttil did anything to hide this aspect of his election. Speaking to the press and at first meetings he has described his election as “renewal” and his mission as “regaining of trust”. There would be nothing to renew if there was not an element of mustiness and passé feeling around the current batch of PN exponents. You would not speak of “regaining trust” without implicitly acknowledging that this has been lost – and we all know where the fingers are being pointed. So yes, Simon’s election included the admission of the problems that the current strand of GonziPN is facing. They had to.

So far so good. Simon Busuttil, the champion of new and change trounced Fenech at the voting counter by garnering two-thirds of the vote of PN’s councillors. A message had been “sent” also to the cabinet old guard. What next though? What is this “charm offensive” all about?

What change?

Let us begin with the obvious. As we stated earlier the post of deputy leader is quite a cameo role. It has been for a long time and the first question to ask is “What clout does Simon Busuttil have as deputy leader?” On the one hand he has to fit in and “work with others”. There’s the party leader who cannot be seen as too weak himself – so Simon will speak about “working in tandem”. He speaks of combining Gonzi’s experience with his. His what exactly? Apart from the smiles and monotone affirmations of his will to change what does Simon bring to the PN? He has already been part of the “listening exercise” – having exalted the “MYChoice” and “MyVoice” experiences as being useful. Is that enough?

Simon has rebuffed Debono, Mugliette and JPO so thankfully his early entreaties to reconciliation have been banished to the bin. What will he do to win the trust of the voters? Will Simon only serve as a dilution of the GONZIPN trademark in order to save the PN from the negative connotations that the GonziPN brand has come to mean? Politically – policy wise – Simon does not seem to think that any form of change is necessary. His emphasis in the message to voters is simply that they cannot abandon a team that works: “if you do not want to put all our achievements in jeopardy – and that includes achievements in jobs, health and education – then please put your trust back in the Nationalist party“.

So what change exactly? Apparently Simon puts his finger on the issue of arrogance. It would seem that the polls within the Dar Centrali are pointing to arrogance as the number one problem within the PN. It goes like this… the policies are ok, the system is working (no matter how much Labour depicts a failing economy and country)… all we need to change are the arrogant bunch of bastards who have been there for too long. Enter Simon, il-wiċċ taz-zokkor, and he will give the machine a new wrapping. Do you think I am hallucinating? Really? How about this gem from the horse’s mouth (speaking at Tarxien PN Club on Sunday):

“People say they want change, but of faces, not of policies or results. People are happy with those. And we’re giving them exactly that,” he said.

Provare per credere – as the Italians would say. Unless Simon was misquoted by Bertrand Borg of the Times we have quite an “admission” on our hands. On the other hand you cannot fault him for thinking that way. Tonio Fenech’s budget was so good that even Labour want to adopt it. The Labour alternative insofar as economic planning is concerned is an absolute mess – just look at the abysmal performance of the Vella-Scicluna-Mangion triumvirate at the press conference. So the people want change because they are bored with the current batch? Let’s give them change – we’ll give them new faces.

Only that Simon is banking on a new army of what he calls “high-calibre” candidates that are the product of the same system of vetting that gave the nationalist party Franco Debono, Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando and Jesmond Mugliette. You just have to look at the posturing of Austin Gatt’s minion Manuel Delia (last seen speaking about “intelligent transport systems” as though Arriva was a nightmare that happened to others) to see that Simon’s “new faces” are not all that tip-top as he is gearing them up to be.

In buona sostanza

And finally substance. There’s the whole business of the liberal democrat orphans that might need to be addressed. The last in a series of budgets might have been criticised for being too gracious with the haves and too little for the have nots but there is an uncanny consistency in the PN economic model that is far from being negative. Notwithstanding the political rollercoaster caused by the one-seat majority, Gonzi’s PN has managed to steer in a clear direction economic crisis notwithstanding. Budget measures and incentives remain strongly family-centred (as always) and the business model is based on give and take (to qualify for incentives you are expected to invest) which is not all that bad given the scenario. Apart from the energy fiasco you could also find it in yourself to accept a graduated approach to the utility bills.

Having said all that the social rights issues remain GonziPN’s weak point. Their association with the conservative agenda (or opting for it) means that they risk abandoning a part of what hitherto has been an important contribution to bulking up their mass of vote. They may still be lucky that such voters as give priority to their social issues (censorship, gay rights, lay model society, criminal law reform) are unable to put their vote where their mouth is. GonziPN + Simon will still bank on the endgame played out on the eve of an election – It’s either us or them (them being Labour – AD don’t count).

What with all the talk about change and European Values, Simon has failed to hint whether his “change” will also include a rapprochement with the liberal elements that have until now served to beef up that crucial vote. I doubt very much this will happen this time round because Simon probably believes that between changing faces, a bumbling opposition and a few overtures of trust and openness (known colloquially as bżar fl-għajnejn) PN might once again snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

Sadly, the charm offensive might prove just right and the PN will have forfeit an opportunity for real change.

Se vogliamo che tutto rimanga come è, bisogna che tutto cambi.

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Politics

Malta Post Franco (III) – GonziPN

I really do not find Joseph Muscat’s constant referring to the Nationalist Party as GonziPN productive or palatable. Probably Muscat thinks the same of anyone who still refers to him as “Inhobbkom” Joseph. But this is not about Muscat. This post is about the party that made it to government in 2008 against all odds and got to govern with a one-seat majority. The one-seat majority is Malta’s version of the “majority prize” that adjusts the parliamentary distribution of seats in order to just about have a majority of parliamentary members who were elected on one party ticket. Yes it is important to make that distinction. I did say “elected on one party’s ticket” and not “who support the party”.

It is not too fine a distinction and it is the distinction upon which the current uncertainty of governance lies. Its roots pass through the recruitment stage for candidates in 2008 by the Nationalist party and pass further down through the last leadership battle won by Lawrence Gonzi and lead at to the very bottom of the party’s recent history when the faction based on marketing, polls and pragmatic results started to eat away at the values that defined what the nationalist party represented and most of all that had forged the choices that were at the basis of visions for the future.

The Context

It was a domino effect that resulted from the party’s adaptation to the realities of post-Berlin wall politics – a reality that was only postponed for two reasons. Firstly, in the immediate aftermath of “the End of History” when the continent’s politicians were dabbling with the discourses of Fukuyama, a Nationalist Malta was busy reconstructing a nation from the badly managed socialist heritage of the late seventies and eighties. The “Xogħol, Ġustizzja, Libertà” and “Solidarjetà… dejjem.. kullimkien” slogans were not simply populist mating calls wooing the electorate but building blocks for a new society. There was promise and a set of values around which to plan the future. The nationalist party had no time for internecine squabbles between 1987 and 1994. It was busy.

Then came the second reason for the postponement of any need to adapt to “the End of History”. The challenge to drag an unwilling nation (there never was unanimity in this matter) into the EU proved to be an energy sapping exercise. The mission to join the EU club provided the necessary “value-driven” campaign that could keep the nationalist movement that had been constructed around Eddie Fenech Adami together for a while longer. Last election I wrote many a time that these choices (modernisation, construction of a democratic nation, EU membership) were “obvious choices” for which the PN should not be blowing its own trumpet too often. They may have been obvious to me and to many an educated gent and lady who had lived through the socialist period and longed to join the Western world but they were not obvious for Alfred Sant (and Joseph Muscat at the time) and his freezing of the EU membership bid in 1996 was ironically the freshest breath of air for a nationalist party that had been badly bruised by the electoral result.

In an ironic twist of the historical narrative Dom Mintoff proved to be the saviour of the nationalist party’s renewed bid to join the EU. From the hara-kiri of Sant’s short-lived government to May 2004 the Nationalist machine – party and government  – had one obsession, one goal, one direction that did not allow for any distraction (let alone dissension). And then, starting from the infamous Luxol Ground speech by Eddie Fenech Adami the nationalist party lost its reference points and the downward spiral began. Bereft of the main challenges that had kept its clock ticking the PN suddenly discovered that for the first time since 1981 it was a party without a cause. All too suddenly it had become a mirror image of its greatest enemy: all noise and no substance.

All the Men that made GonziPN

This was the party that Lawrence Gonzi inherited after the war of attrition with the Dalli faction. Sure, the rot of many years in power had begun to set in. Sure, the cliques and favors that would eventually translate into media stories of nepotism and friends of friends networks continued to eat at the foundations of a party that had lost its compass. These were effects though, not causes, of the great decline of the PN machinery. 2008 was the benchmark year. In order to win at the polls again the PN dropped any remaining travesty of being a party with a plan and transformed into a Presidential movement. PN became GonziPN and the party machinery ditched the value-driven inspiration in favour of the marketing machinery and the dogs of war.

Having an opposition that puts up a feeble fight did not help obviate the redundancies in the policy category. After all who needs ideas when you can win by simply saying “Don’t vote for the other?”. The race for number one votes on the ballots meant that the web cast for potential candidates was as wide as possible (and with the only consideration being vote pulling factor). Errors that had already been committed at local council level with unpalatable candidates being preferred in favour of statistical and numerical victories were now repeated at national level. How did the Pullicino Orlando’s, the Mugliett’s and the Debono’s end up on the nationalist benches in parliament? Ask the 2008 “successful” campaigners – they will tell you. All that GonziPN needed was a slogan – a dream that might link its quest to past substance – and even for that it went and filched it off Monsieur Sarkozy. “Ensemble tout est possible” became unshamefacedly “Flimkien kollox possibli”. The die was cast.

Few would deny that the 2008 victory was a victory by default. GonziPN did not win the election, it was Sant’s Labour that lost it. Before long heroes such as JPO were bouncing up and down on their seats – not content to have survived the travesty of marketing and bitching that could have very well meant the downfall of this kind of politic had Sant played his cards properly. There can be no doubt that the downfall of this government was fashioned within the halls of Dar Centrali back in 2008 when the decision was made to transform a movement of social values and economic well-being into a presidential party honed for power without a back up plan.

Such short-sightedness was also the result of an unwillingness to engage with its own roots and to take up the unfinished business of creating a post-Berlin Wall raison d’etre.  It was a mixture of laziness and excessive confidence that combined with a new generation of Young Turks who had been bred to unquestionably blend in to the echelons of power without engaging with new ideas. The PN born out of the 2008 election was the final death stab at the inspirational party that had read the national narrative so well for so long. From the moment GonziPN’s disparate motley crew took its place in parliament to govern with its artificial relative majority, “uncertainty” was a time bomb waiting to happen.

Dealing with Franco

Delaying writing this post has had its advantages. By now the General Council has ended and we all know how Lawrence Gonzi has chosen to deal with the hot potato that is Franco Debono. Can it be surprising that the party that opted for the Presidential-style mould will try to solve this latest challenge by reinforcing the presidential image? The end-of-term leadership race will in all probability turn into a victory by acclamation by Lawrence Gonzi. Who will dare stir the boat any further? Inevitably the leadership “challenge” will buy the PN time in government. Franco can no longer legitimately yell his lack of confidence in Lawrence Gonzi – even he will have to bow to the nationalist party’s vote.

Buying time also means buying time for the government projects that were coming to their end to be finalised. There will inevitably be accusatory fingers pointed at projects and laws finished and enacted on the eve of an election. Honestly speaking most would have been end-of-term projects anyway and would have suffered the same fate. That is not the biggest problem for GonziPN. The biggest problem is that this  “leadership race” is the last-ditch reaction by Lawrence Gonzi and worse, an insistence on engaging within the “presidential” context dynamic. What remains to be seen and what is of paramount importance for the party is whether it is learning from the past mistakes. To do so it has to acknowledge them humbly and prepare to rebuild from scratch.

2012 is many political light years away from 1989. It might still not be too late for the nationalist party to make an appointment with history and use this latest borrowed time to take up real politics (not realpolitik) once again. For that it needs less noise, less drama, less taste-based propaganda and bull and to concentrate on the substance. Values, policies and a bottom-up realisation that this is the time to face new challenges within new parameters might only just make it.

Will fate throw another lifeline for the PN and spare it the (by now very necessary) years of rebuilding in opposition? We can only hope that if it does then the Nationalist party gets down to the real business of politics.

Categories
Politics

He ain't heavy, he's my Jeffrey

As expected, GonziPN is already rallying up for the challenge of the double-D boob thrown at them by JPO (Double D stands for Divorce Debate in case you were wondering). The first concern for PN remains the need to convey the clear message that there is no threat to the relative majoirty – single seat government (obtained with a 1,600 vote majority – giving it very little moral authority to impose whatever principles it espouses beyond normal day to day managament of the nation). That concern has been shaken by JPO’s renegade move. At least we have to believe it is a renegade movethat has been both unvetoed and unvetted by the PN parliamentary group because, if we are to stick to this line, JPO presented this clone of Ireland’s Divorce Act without any help from his friends.

Unity before discussion is therefore a major point on Gonzi’s agenda. Even before venturing into the proselytising, catholic pandering and blatant ignorance of the duties of society towards the minority who do not believe that their life should be ruled by the Curia – even before that – Gonzi & Co had to reconcile JPO’s position with their own, for the sake of the government. Hence the comments last night by our PM appearing in this morning’s papers which are very revealing in deed – no need to wait for the parliamentary group’s meeting:

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said this evening he did not agree with Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando’s position and with the method he used in presenting a private member’s bill on bill. He told timesofmalta.com: “This is a very serious matter. I have called a Parliamentary group meeting tomorrow, this has to be followed by a discussion at party level. Only then will we be able to take an official position.” Dr Pullicino Orlando, the Prime Minister said, took a personal initiative based on his personal position which was well known, so his position did not surprise anyone. However, Dr Gonzi said, this subject was so important that the electorate should have the opportunity to express itself after being informed. (The Unlinkable Times)

There you have it. The three pronged approach.

In primis, (you can imagine the serious face here) there is the acceptance of the fact that (a) GonziPN (the entity represented by the man) does not agree with JPO (rally behind me those who care for our future!) (b) GonziPN draws second blood by criticising the method of this travesty of a backstab (Private Members’ Bill? What’s that?). So the battleground is clear. Insofar as principles are concerned GonziPN’s camp is clearly in disaccord with the renegade sipper of teas. Insofar as method is concerned the jibe is less effective. When, after all, is a Private Members’ Bill useful in this duopolistic excuse for a parliament of ours if not in this kind of situation when it is patently obvious that none of the two formations supposedly representing the people seem to have an interest in putting before the assembly the largest elephent in the national hall? Bollocks to “I do not agree with the method”. Of course you don’t Lawrence. Even (and I stress that even) the conniving ginger boy in opposition recognises the use of the Private Member’s Bill although admittedly his intended use thereof was the closest time ever that politics could be described as being dyslexic.

In secundis there is the “very serious matter” business (as opposed to the comic matter of the price of oil, the hilarious matter of the White Rocks Complex tender process and the side-splitting matter of the barriers to electoral reform posed by PLPN). Indeed divorce is a serious matter requiring serious and informed debate. A serious and informed debate includes an end that is a final decision on whether it is to become law or not and not the abstract debate based on mental masturbation and catholic smugness that has dominated the island for nigh twenty years. So yes, Gonzi is right in describing the subject as “serious”. Contrary to all impressions, Gonzi & PN – two of the branches of the uncomfortable trinity of Gonzi & PN & Renegades – still do not have an official position on divorce. Have we been given a clue to a possible “official position” for PN MPs? Instead Gonzi is telling us that GonziPn still has to refine this political opportunity before launching the counterattack.

The build up has already started because in tertio GonziPN does not hesitate to clearly and unequivocally declare that JPO “took a personal initiative” (bang) that is “based on his personal position” (bang, bang) “which was well known” (bandage), so “his position did not surprise anyone” (bandage). Of course JPOs position did not surprise anyone. He almost gets away with it, he does this Gonzi. The “he ain’t heavy, he’s my brother” approach focuses on the content and away from the earlier gaffe regarding the method. Not so bloody surprising eh? So you all expected a Private Members’ Bill introducing divorce right? But wait. That’s not what you are saying. You are saying that you are not surprised that JPO has a diametrically opposed position to the GonziPN mainstream and that he has backstabbed the whole parliamentary group with this bill without so much as a “by your leave”. No shit Sherlock.

And that brings us to Gonzi’s last tirade. He did say that the subject is important (and serious) so “the electorate should have the opportunity to express itself after being informed”. An enigmatic sentence from the Sphinx would have been simpler to solve. You can of course understand it in the sense that in this country the regulation of divorce has the same perceived moral weight as say the introduction of the death sentence, the legalisation of abortion and the legalisation of marijuana. From that perspective it is probably understandable that every step of the way is transparent to the electorate as does not happen in other areas such as the awarding of land to foreigners, or the partitioning of electoral clout by the two main parties. So we will have a debate – and what a debate that promises to be – over the summer and presumably over the first months following the resumption of parliament after summer.

For good times, for bad times

The hidden bomb in this recognition of the importance of the electorate is one that has not been reckoned hitherto by the liberal advocates – the abrogative referendum. That’s a referendum proposed by the people (or an interest group) purposely to abrogate a law that has been enacted by parliament. And this is why divorce is a serious subject. Unless the argument is won convincingly explaining that divorce is a “right” of an important minority in this country while recognising that a majority of this country are still free to practice their religious beliefs and not use that right (also watch out for the faux laiques – against divorce because of the damage to the social fabric), unless that is done we risk having the shortest-lived divorce legislation in history. And that too could be thanks to a smug section of Gonzi’s PN.

Finally Gonzi’s comments are reconciliatory. Once again Jeffrey is the naughty boy who is tolerated by the slim majority PN. Whether such magnanimity is due to the thin line of parliamentary majority held by Gonzi’s rainbow party is another question. It is important for GonziPN to seem to be unwavered by this latest backstabbing setback. True, this time the party has changed what seemed to be a slip into a golden opportunity to trump the empty words of Muscat’s progressives who are left cycling in thin air but once again the fruits of PN’s rag-tag assemblage before the election are being sown. No matter – everybody can be carried on the bandwagon – after all “he ain’t heavy, he’s my Jeffrey”.

The road is long
With many a winding turn
That leads us to who knows where
Who knows where
But I’m strong
Strong enough to carry him
He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother

So on we go
His welfare is of my concern
No burden is he to bear
We’ll get there
For I know
He would not encumber me

If I’m laden at all
I’m laden with sadness
That everyone’s heart
Isn’t filled with the gladness
Of love for one another.

It’s a long, long road
From which there is no return
While we’re on the way to there
Why not share
And the load
Doesn’t weigh me down at all
He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother.

He’s my brother
He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother