Succession

Prime Minister and PL Leader Joseph Muscat has declared he will shortly be resigning all his appointments.

A n enormous majority of PL members and of party supporters disagree that this should happen. Some argue that the race it will trigger to elect a successor would destabilise the party and the country.

Though their concern has importance, it does not seem to me to be the strongest argument against what the Prime Minister is proposing. Over the years, in the two major parties and including when they were in government, leadership transitions occurred under quite acute conditions of political competition. Yet they did not leave behind them incurable wounds.

The best argument against is that the political project laid out by Muscat himself regarding how Malta should develop seems to be midway to the endpoint where he wanted to drive it – along a path that has been greatly successful. No one can understand why this line of action should not be brought to its endpoint by the same person who laid it out. That is what would make political sense, not just from a partisan perspective but also equally, from a national perspective.

A project led by no party

Developments in the UK over the implementation of Brexit illustrate the enormous problems that arise in a representative parliamentary democracy when a project that promotes fundamental changes, is launched by a body which is not an organised political party operating according to a precise action programme.

The Brexit movement was not spearheaded by any party. It was run by influential protagonists coming from both main parties in Britain. It won a referendum but did not have the backing of a united political structure focussed on implementing Brexit according to some definite programme.

There followed the uncertainties and disagreements within the UK that have shocked so many people. The Europeans succeeded in negotiating an agreement that boxed the British into a corner. There is a House of Commons majority against the agreement but no majority in favour of some alternative arrangement. The result has been confusion.

I was always sceptical about the use of a referendum in a parliamentary democracy. The Brexit outcome has reinforced my suspicions.

“I was always sceptical about the use of a referendum in a parliamentary democracy.

The parties today

The structures of the past are no longer there.

Then, there would be assiduous members always present at the frequent meetings organised for them at their clubs, plus a local committee whose members enjoyed esteem and appreciation within their community, and management structures that went up from the local level to the general conference and its executive committee.

In one way or another, such structures are still to be found in all democratic parties. But social media are flattening them out by dominating all discourse between citizens, Parties as well as their election candidates have no alternative but to employ social media to get their messages across to party members and to the wider society. Even the methods deployed by some political parties to organise their own internal elections rely on social media.

We seem to have arrived to the point where even the parties can recognize their own members only in a “virtual” sense – namely as visual and written responses coming in from the other side of a laptop or iphone, but not as physical personalities.

Gozo debate

During a public debate held recently in Gozo at which I participated, topics that have featured for a long while in such meetings were raised again. All were related to connectivity problems. These are still causing the departure of many Gozitans who go to live in Malta, huge inconveniences to Gozitans who work in Malta and underinvestment in promising sectors.

However some aspects of the existing shortfalls in connectivity leave me nonplussed. All right, a tunnel is to be built between the two islands. Whether one agees with it or not, one must still agree that some years need to elapse before it becomes operational.

Meanwhile, efforts should be made to not allow connectivity problems from escalating. For instance, the prevailing volumes of passenger traffic between the islands surely justify the commissioning of a new ship in the Gozo Channel fleet. It also makes necessary the quick resolution of the legal tangle that has stymied the establishment of a fast ferry service. As well, total priority should be given to the cable that was about to be set up between Malta and Gozo to ensure that internet provision is technologically cutting edge.

Why is it that these initiatives seem to have jammed?

Ronnie Pellegrini

I knew that Ronnie was seriously ill but the last time I had seen him, some two weeks earlier, he was still fighting back. By the beginning of this week, he had lost his fight.

I got to know him well a long time ago, when he served as shop steward for workers at Bortex and I was chairman of the company’s board. Times were tough as the clothing industry was losing competitiveness. More than once or twice we clashed in a big way.

Later, we had disagreements of a different sort when I served as President of the Labour Party and he was a leading figure in Labour’s youth section, within the “Lorry Sant” faction, as it used to be known.

As the years went by, I came to appreciate increasingly his way of doing things: he would be ready to go for confrontation but this would always be in genuine mode, above all in a spirit of loyalty to the Labour Party and the GWU. I got used to having full trust in him and have never had to regret this. We became friends and remained like so.

There was a huge courage in how he endured his illness, and I could only admire it. I will miss his advice, his support and his energy. My deep condolences go to his wife and all his family.

Paola

With the weather converging towards spring, the main square at Paola has become a very pretty site... or it will be when the newly planted trees come to full maturity. I was there over the weekend in the morning and it was quite a happy scene.

All those I spoke to agreed that there has been a quality leap in how the place is run. There was just one complaint: traffic flows have been organized differently to how they were in the past. I believe that people will eventually become accustomed to the change. I too lost my bearings when driving over into the square...

After all, we hear so many complaints about what goes on in our streets and squares. It is only fair that when a change in this area has been successful, it is at least given some acknowledgement.