PN leadership election and other reflections

The PN leadership race has become quite a cutthroat affair. Sources within the PN say that practically all four contenders have their own groups of people inside the party headquarters, ‘working for them’ behind the scenes, trying to curry favour with the kunsilliera and tesserati, who will be voting in the first and second rounds respectively, and also with the party employees.

But our little birds tell us that some of these people have taken a less innocent approach and, instead of promoting their favourite contenders, are engaging in campaigns to undermine those who they consider to be the most dangerous opponents.

It is unclear whether the candidates themselves are fully aware of what is going on but our sources say that these cliques are very openly trying to harm the chances of their adversaries (the exact words of one source was “jagħmlu l-ħsara”). This has led to some tension between groups of employees who side with different contenders.

But on the other hand, it can be argued that if these contenders are fighting so hard to get elected, this can only be a good thing, especially since they are fighting for a post that very few

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would want. The role of PN and Opposition leader, after two landslide defeats at the polls, is not exactly a job one would be envious of.

Apart from these manoeuvres, most of the contenders seem to be taking the election process very seriously and are dedicating all their time to press conferences, meetings with party activists and paying home visits to tesserati. These contenders also have sizeable teams made up of enthusiastic people, mostly youths, and this is another good sign which shows that the PN is not really gripped by apathy, as some would like to think. On the other hand, the party is buzzing with activity.

Lija traffic situation

Some weeks back, this newspaper was first to report that a number of mature holm oak trees were being cut down in Lija, with the authorities saying that this was done to ease the traffic situation by creating a new lane. The area just looks strange without the trees but, aesthetics aside, the traffic situation is still a nightmare.

While the traffic heading from Lija towards Birkirkara (the trees were removed on this side of the road) might have eased, traffic heading towards Mosta still gets gridlocked because of the new mega supermarket up on Valletta Road.

Traffic on Saturday morning was brought to a complete standstill and the reason was that cars were queuing up to enter the supermarket’s parking area. This was obviously very badly designed and no major entry-exit way should be linked directly to a main road.

Money laundering

More than two weeks have passed since we sent questions to the Finance Ministry after Malta was requested to explain, by the European Commission, why it had failed to transpose the latest EU directive on money laundering into national law. After the fallout from the Panama Papers and claims (backed up by FIAU reports) of money laundering, tax evasion and kickbacks by senior government officials, one would expect the government to immediately update its laws on the subject. One would also expect the ministry to treat journalists with a little more respect and have the basic courtesy to answer questions, especially when they are on such an important issue.