Simon Busuttil pledges to deliver results by first 100 days in office

Opposition Leader Simon Busuttil promised to deliver positive results for Gozo in the first 100 days of a Nationalist Party government.

He was addressing a PN mass meeting in Rabat, Gozo, before a particularly energetic crowd. Many times throughout the Opposition Leader’s speech, the crowd interrupted with chants of ‘Simon, Simon’.

“I want to give you hope that after Saturday’s vote, we are ready to get to work from day one, and we know what we are doing. We have a dedicated programme for Gozo, a serious plan, and we are therefore determined to start delivering results in our first hundred days in office,” he told the crowd.

“The Prime Minister made fools of us when he said that his government wanted to do a lot of things in the first 100 days in office... what is sure is that we will not be acquiring any companies in Panama in our first 100 days in office,” he said, to loud applause.

The PL Government entered a public private partnership with Vitals Global Healthcare. This effectively means that a minority stake, meaning less than 50 per cent, of the public Gozo General Hospital to a private health company called Vitals, after heavy controversy.

The government, after coming under heavy fire, did release the contracts – albeit being heavily redacted.

Dr Busuttil pledged that a PN government would give Gozo back its hospital, and ensure that it is once again in the hands of the public.

He repeated claims that he will instruct the Gozo Minister, upon being sworn in, to immediately address the issue of breaking the Vitals contract.

He also promised that a PN government would publish the PL government contract with Vitals, without any redactions.

Workers scheduled to work for Vitals in the Gozo hospital will continue to work there as planned Dr Busuttil said. EU funds would be used to modernise the hospital, and develop it into a state of the art facility, adding that this is how such great results were achieved for Mater Dei and the Oncology Centre.

Turning to the permanent link between Malta and Gozo, where the tunnel has been found to be most feasible, Dr Busuttil said this project is a dream of his. Both PN and PL governments have spoken often about this tunnel, and the PL government commissioned some studies, however the two mainstream parties have dragged their feet on the matter.

He promised that once the geological studies are concluded works to begin the tunnel project would begin immediately.

Appealing to those ‘genuine Nationalist’ supporters, Dr Busuttil said that he acknowledges that the PN had isolated voters, were heavy on the bureaucracy and were not flexible enough, he said that with Gozo becoming a dedicated region, with its own council, many mistakes of the past would not be repeated.

Appealing to ‘genuine Labour’ supporters, Dr Busuttil said that the programme for Gozo was written by a young engineer from a mixed political background, and that his only interest was Gozo.

PN Deputy Leaders Beppe Fenech Adami, Mario de Marco and Democratic Party leader Marlene Farrugia also addressed the event.

Dr Farrugia got the crowd going after chanting ‘come on Nationalists’ to a sea of people dressed in blue, while being leader of the orange PD.

The PN and PD have entered into a coalition called Forza Nazzjonali – National Force.

Dr Fenech Adami reminded the Gozitan crowd that a “PN government always took care of Gozo. In the 60s we built the hospital, after being forgotten in the 70s and 80s by PL governments, and it was a PN government in the 90s that built new roads, new infrastructure and gave Gozo what it deserved”.

Dr de Marco said that he was addressing the crowd with a sense of humility, and also excused the PN on not delivering everything that it deserved.

“Gozo has a dream, that an economic miracle does not stop at Malta, but also reaches Gozo. The choice to live in Gozo or Malta should be a choice, and not a necessity,” he said.

He reminded the crowd of the Panama Papers scandal, where it was found that Minister Konrad Mizzi and the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Keith Schembri were caught out each with a Panama company sheltered by trusts in New Zealand.