An attempt at reviving Eddie
PN Deputy Leader Beppe Fenech Adami has confirmed with The Malta Independent that the Fenech Adami family will soon launch a website called ‘Eddie Fenech Adami’, which will feature tapes of the former President’s speeches.
Eddie Fenech Adami is a former President, a former Prime Minister and former Leader of the PN. His political highlights were in the turbulent 1980s when he led the Opposition to become a national movement against the then Mintoff oligarchy and later as Prime Minister when he secured Malta’s EU membership.
He has been out of the limelight for quite a while, with very few major appearances, one of which being at the Floriana Granaries just prior to the 2013 General Elections when he was presented to PN diehards in a last bid before the biggest electoral defeat suffered by the party.
“Unfortunately today, when one goes online, you get the impression that the only mass meeting speech he gave was at the Granaries, or his famous budget speech. Over the past few months, and which I was primarily responsible for doing, we started formatting the old VHS tapes of the 1980s mass meetings into a digital format, which will be launched with the site,” Dr Beppe Fenech Adami said.
He is the former President’s son and is currently one of two Deputy Leader of the Nationalist Party. The new website comes with a launch party which will take place on Thursday 24th November in Mdina.
A quick glance at the invite sent to many of those who worked with the PN icon, one notices that the PN is not involved in this initiative. Could it be that not everyone at the PN headquarters is happy with this revival?
But Beppe Fenech Adami described the new website as a family project and said he doesn’t think the PN should have been involved, even for example, financially.
Asked why he has decided to do this now given that the former President has been out of the scene for quite a number of years, Dr Beppe Fenech Adami said: “As time is running out. If we don’t do this now, it will probably never be done. It was a question of getting down to it. Back at home we had shelves of mass meeting speeches which I think are an important chapter in Malta’s political history. This will now be shared on the web for everyone to enjoy.”
From the outside, this can be viewed as yet another push at bringing the name Eddie Fenech Adami back into the spotlight. Recently, a book titled Eddie: LIstorja f’1000 Ritratt, was also launched. The book is full of photos from mass meetings and historical moments with Eddie Fenech Adami being the protagonist always portrayed surrounded by party loyalists.
The book was edited by former PN Information Director Frank Psaila and is heavily endorsed by the party machine. PN Leader Simon Busuttil said during his Independence speech in September that the party has “switched its electoral machine and will not put it off until the election.”
Eddie Fenech Adami became PN Leader in 1978. He was elected Prime Minister from 1987 until 1996, and again from 1998 until 2004. Subsequently he was President of Malta from 2004 to 2009 and was succeeded by former Labour Deputy Leader Dr George Abela.