Constitutional Convention: let’s get on with it

If for no other reason, the assembling of the Constitutional Convention the government has been promising is an absolute necessity to redefine the country’s constitutional neutrality to meet the exigencies of this day and age.

Malta’s neutrality, which had been crafted in and for different times, was strongly challenged during the 2011 Libyan revolution and it is being challenged today as the world bands together to combat the growing nemesis of terrorism.

There are, of course, several other areas of the Constitution that deserve updating, tweaking or complete redrafting and there is ample scope to do so within the remit of the Constitutional Convention that Prime Minister Joseph Muscat has been speaking of since at least 2011.

At the time he had said, “One of the basic differences between the parties, as well as being one of our key proposals, is that we want to hold a Constitutional Convention, where we bring together civil society, political parties and all those involved where we can come up with something better.

“We want to give birth to a second republic, which is a totally different scenario than hotchpotch amendments – we have to determine what our republic stands for and not just make a couple of piecemeal changes to shut up a backbencher. What we are talking about is a lot more than that.”

That would certainly be a feather in the Prime Minister’s cap heading into the next general election, but it could on the other hand serve the party in government better to blame the Opposition for the failure to set up the Convention.

The Opposition also has a lot to gain from such a Convention, where some of the numerous proposals contained in its recent policy paper on good governance require constitutional changes. Reacting to the Opposition’s 109-point good governance document, the Prime Minister has said that those changes being proposed that were of a constitutional nature, of which there are several extremely valid proposals, could be discussed within the remit of the upcoming Constitutional Convention.

Although the Prime Minister has been speaking of holding such a Convention since back in his Opposition days, little has been said of it since the 2013 election – except for the government’s announcement in March 2013 of the appointment of Franco Debono, the Opposition’s bête noir, as its chairman.

On the face of it, it is extremely positive that the Prime Minister had invited Dr Busutill to withdraw the Opposition’s reservations on the Constitutional Convention, but below the surface is the fact that the government had appointed a highly divisive character as the Convention’s chair – a person the government knows full well is a persona non grata as far as the party is concerned, given the strife and turmoil of the Nationalist Party’s last year of the previous legislature.

If there was any sincerity to the Prime Minister’s invitation, he would have invited the Opposition leader in for talks on their differences vis-à-vis the Convention and on who is to lead it.

This did not happen. With the Opposition apparently dead set against Dr Debono chairing the Convention – given his more than chequered history with the PN – it is clear that the Prime Minister will later be able to turn around and accuse the Opposition of having refused to play ball.

As AD chairman Arnold Cassola put it to this newspaper in an interview a full two years ago: “The Prime Minister appointed Dr Debono to lead the Constitutional Convention and nothing has happened and nothing will happen, because the Nationalists will not participate in a Convention chaired by the man who humiliated them.

“The Prime Minister purposely appointed Franco Debono because he knows that the Nationalists will not participate in the Convention, purely because he [the Prime Minister] does not really want these changes. He wants to delay them as much as possible until it’s comfortable for him to give out a morsel as if it were a concession. This is all a case of playing to the gallery.”

If this is indeed the case, perhaps the Opposition should call the government’s bluff, swallow its pride and accept Debono to chair the Convention. After all, does it really matter who holds the gavel?

On the other hand, if the government is serious about the Convention, it should really be attempting to meet the Opposition halfway, and listen to some possibly mutually agreeable suggestions for the Convention’s chair.

This is yet another tit-for-tat Kafkaesque situation that benefits the people in no way whatsoever, earns cheap political points and obstructs the very essence of what is up for discussion: bettering the country’s very foundations.

It is hoped that the PN’s and PL’s differences of opinion over the composition of the Constitutional Convention, and any other teething problems that may be holding it back, are thrashed out so that both parties can work together on good governance, which is, after all, the very epitome of the national interest.