A party in limbo
The once invincible Labour Party seems to be crumbling, at least on the inside.
Of course, if an election were to be held tomorrow, the PL would still win by a landslide, but the Labour Party of today is only a shadow of what it used to be up until a few days ago.
The unity and blind loyalty seem to have disappeared among the confusion.
The Keith Schembri drama, of course, is at the centre of all this. The disgraced former OPM chief of staff is still under investigation, both in connection with the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia and with possible obstruction of justice, a court heard last week.
Genuine labourites are shocked and even cabinet ministers are now trying to distance themselves from disgraced OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri.
The man who was once hailed as the “mastermind” behind the 2017 election by Parliamentary Secretary Silvio Schembri has now become toxic and no one wants to touch him with a ten-foot pole, it seems.
Gone are the days where Schembri was hailed as the Labour hero who helped deliver ten consecutive election wins. Now, he is being called a traitor and several of his former colleagues called on the party to kick him out.
The fangs are out. Last week, economy minister and PL deputy leader Chris Cardona, who says he was the victim of an attempted frame-up, said the party should kick Schembri out. Outspoken One Productions chairman Jason Micallef, usually a backer of everything Labour, also said the party should kick Schembri out with immediate effect and make a public declaration. The party is bigger than any one individual, he said.
Labour CEO Randolph Debattista also took a dig at Schembri, and posted a ‘find my iPhone’ meme, with reference to the revelation this week that Schembri has claimed with investigators that he had lost his phone.
Yet, despite these calls and others, the PL did not sack Schembri. It waited. And Schembri resigned on his own steam. This did not earn any brownie points for the party, which has consistently defended uncovered cases of corruption during the past six years.
The party did not call for any resignations when Schembri (and Konrad Mizzi’s) Panama companies were uncovered by Daphne. It stayed quiet during all major scandals and stood behind its ‘soldiers’ despite the filth that was coming out.
Even now that one of its most prominent members finds himself under investigation in one of the biggest political events this country has ever seen, it did not call on Schembri to resign and did not sack him. No, it left Schembri the choice of resigning. What would the party have done had Schembri not given in and resigned?
Labour supporters are confused and rightly so. The party they look up to seems to be floating in limbo – there is no leadership to speak of. Worse still, conflicting messages are being sent out. Muscat, the outgoing Prime Minister, has barely said a word about his old friend and former close colleague. Many of his ministers have openly voiced their opinions but Muscat has not. It is rumoured that Schembri and Muscat are still in regular contact, although that remains to be proven.
The ongoing leadership race could well serve to unite the party once again and give it clear direction, especially when it comes to speaking on and dealing with corruption. But until then, the PL will bleed some more, because leadership elections are not a pretty thing, not in the PL and not in the PN either.
This is a time when factions are formed, backing one contender or another, and when daggers are drawn and used to hurt the opposing side.
The fact remains that we will still have a Labour government come 11 January. One hopes that the Labour delegates and members choose wisely and elect a Prime Minister who is truly capable of getting the party, and more importantly the country, out of the mess they find themselves in.