Muscat’s luck is Abela’s misfortune
It is said that a new leader’s first 100 days in power will serve to gauge how his or her administration is going to function for the rest of the tenure.
It has been a baptism of fire for Malta’s new head of government.
Robert Abela has been in office as Malta’s Prime Minister for just over 60 days, and he has already had to face – and is still facing, until only God knows when – an unprecedented medical crisis which is bringing with it a severe economic effect that will last longer than the coronavirus stress on the medical services.
Lucky Joseph Muscat, some may say. He resigned as Prime Minister just at the right time. He had escaped the economic collapse of the late 2000s and the Libyan uprising which had had its adverse impact on Malta as he was still Opposition leader at the time, and now he has escaped the coronavirus spread too. The difficulties he faced in his six and a half years as Prime Minister were all brought upon himself as he failed to tackle corruption and the weakening of Malta’s institutions.
He’s also lucky because in one fell swoop, coronavirus washed away all talk about him and all his shortcomings. But, one day, coronavirus will pass.
Since the Muscat government is still fresh in people’s minds, many are asking themselves what would have been done were he still in office.
Would Muscat have reacted in the same way that Abela is? Or would have there been differences of approach? Given that Muscat’s credo was business, economy and money above anything else, would he have taken the same decisions that Abela has taken, such as halting flights from countries where there is a high number of coronavirus cases? Would he have sacrificed health in favour of the economy?
The debate is open.
Abela has said it many times since he started addressing the nation on a daily basis after the first coronavirus case was registered in Malta thar the priority, at this stage, is to protect public health. The economic effects are not being ignored, and this was seen by the announcement made last Saturday to suspend taxes dues by employers for March and April.
More initiatives are set to be announced by the end of the week. But, as things stand, the main concern is not to allow the virus to spread; the idea is to flatten the graph, so as to keep the peak of number of cases to a minimum and not create so much distress within the health services.
This is why, for example, it was good to note that non-emergency services at Mater Dei Hospital have been stopped as from last Monday. This is to alleviate the pressure on the health sector. While all emergency situations will be given the attention required, what can wait will have to wait. We know that this will cause some inconvenience, but this is a decision that needed to be taken in the best interest of all.
Hearing Robert Abela speak every day on how the government is tackling the coronavirus spread gives a sense of reassurance. We’re not sure if we would have had the same impression if Joseph Muscat had been Prime Minister.