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Matthew Vella and Kurt Sansone analyse the political leanings and chances of the candidates contesting the European Parliament election on 12 June
Tomorrow marks the first anniversary of the election that saw the Nationalist Party elected to government for a second consecutive term with a definitive ticket to take Malta into the European Union.
And the natural consequence of that election victory is that in exactly two months time the electorate will once again be summoned to the polls to elect its five European Parliament representatives. It is an election that is a first of its kind in many respects.
The election will not determine who governs the country and the issues at stake will supposedly be different from those of a general election. The political parties’ electoral campaigns will be somewhat be conditioned by their respective European political groupings.
For the first time Malta will be considered to be one big electoral district, which means that to get elected a candidate would have to poll around 45,000 votes.
And the high threshold will mean that the way votes are transferred to candidates of the same party, or candidates of different parties could be crucial. It will be very difficult for any one candidate to reach the threshold on the first count. The no 2 vote will be of great importance.
Glorified local election
Although the major parties have been careful not to trumpet these elections as a vote of confidence, in the way domestic issues are being handled, it is widely expected that post-12 June the parties will interpret the result according to what suits them best.
Despite being an election for the European Parliament, the electorate is most likely to send a clear message on a number of domestic issues. Indeed, the EP election may resemble a glorified local council election where the electorate expresses its disgruntlement or appreciation of the party in government.
A protest vote against the PN government looks probable at this stage. The economy has failed to perform despite the promise of a mini-boom once Malta signed the Accession Treaty. Manufacturing has continued to shed jobs at an alarming rate and businesses have had to contend with persistent cash flow problems. People have also seen their disposable income take a dip. The cost of living has gone up and matters were made worse with the three per cent increase in VAT last November.
These factors coupled with a general sense of inertia by government in the face of these problems may prompt voters to desert the PN. Eddie Fenech Adami’s unpopular appointment to the highest post in the nation has not helped the PN cause either.
The Nationalist Party has fielded a wide spectrum of candidates pampering to various sections of voters. They have a Gozitan candidate, two women, referendum stalwarts David Casa and Joanna Drake and MIC-wonderboy Simon Busuttil.
The PN’s agenda will be to try and portray the election as one unrelated to domestic events and issues. The pitch will focus on the Party’s consistent stand in favour of membership and an attempt will be made to try and rekindle the post-election feeling of jubilation when Eddie Fenech Adami and Joe Borg went to Athens to sign the accession treaty. The 1 May celebrations are an opportunity for the PN to try and promulgate a feel-good factor.
Labour’s internal confusion
Internal party polls show that the Labour Party is currently enjoying a lead over the PN. But a protest vote may not necessarily translate into a direct advantage for Labour.
The Labour Party is still struggling to convince its core supporters to go out and vote and the level of turnout among traditional Labour voters may very well determine how well the party does.
In its two-step approval of candidates for the EP election, the MLP has elected both moderates and veterans but foregone on women and Gozitans. Joseph Muscat, Louis Grech and John Attard Montalto are considered attractive choices for middle of the road voters. Glenn Bedingfield and Joe Debono Grech are more likely to appeal to the Labour core vote.
But the EP election will also serve as a testing ground for Alfred Sant. Few Labourites will stomach another defeat after losing two elections and a referendum. Sant’s hold on the Party may very well be challenged if Labour scores negatively.
The Labour Party will try to make hay with the general discontent, especially with the European Socialists rally call appropriately being Jobs, Jobs, Jobs. The party is also expected to utilise 1 May as its political launch pad, only that it won’t be the Accession celebrations but Workers’ Day demonstration.
Green hopes
With voters freed from the constraint of having to elect a government, The Green Party is hoping that voters will not simply fly over its head.
The Green Party has traditionally scored good results in pro-PN districts and is most likely to benefit from a protest vote. Fielding one candidate, AD is making sure that none of its votes are wasted. Arnold Cassola’s campaign has consistently highlighted his involvement at a European level with the European Green Party. Competence for the job should not be a problem for Cassola but its going to be the crucial twos and threes that will determine whether he gets elected, something, which has eluded the Green Party in general elections.
A good showing on the first count will boost the Greens’ long-standing claims for reform of the electoral system. On the downside, a negative showing could very well bury AD’s hopes of ever enjoying a strong electoral performance.
An interesting development was the announcement that the hunters’ association was to field its candidate: federation president Lino Farrugia. The extent of the hunting lobby’s vote has never been tested on a national basis. There are some 11,000 registered hunters and 5,000 trappers excluding their family members. It is a strong lobby, but it has yet to be seen whether hunters would vote for a candidate campaigning on a single issue. The hunters are most likely to damage the MLP and PN, much to AD’s jubilation.
A poor showing by Lino Farrugia could, however, dispel the image of a hunting lobby that holds the two major parties at ransom each time an election is due.
On the margins
Other candidates and organisations contesting the EP election are unlikely to leave a mark on the outcome. The independent Gozo candidate could mop up a number of Gozitan votes especially since the MLP has failed to field a Gozitan candidate. Nobody can be elected by banking solely on the Gozitan vote and independent Victor Zammit is hardly expected to be in the running for long.
The rest of the crop includes far-right eccentric Norman Lowell, who may strike a chord with certain sections of society with his anti-immigrant stand. But given Lowell’s antics, he is unlikely to do well and people will most likely take him with a pinch of salt.
Emmy Bezzina, a former Labour candidate, will return to the electoral fray alongside fellow Men’s Rights founder John Zammit.
Both are running on a ticket championing the emarginated and civil rights. Their left wing social agenda is however unlikely to attract many votes even if they may hive off votes that would traditionally belong to AD.
The competing blocks
Nationalist Party
Being the party in government, the PN is likely to be facing an uphill struggle in order to evade the general wave of disillusionment with the current disheartening economic performance. This will be a general test of approval for the Nationalists, now with conservative Lawrence Gonzi at its helm. In line with its 2003 party manifesto, the PN can be expected to extol ad nauseam on what the party did for the country in the last decade and how it intends squeezing the EU dry of all available funds. Its MEP line-up is however the most representative and varied of all line-ups, with two women and a Gozitan candidate included.
A lot of effort will be spent on stressing that the PN is Malta’s natural European party, but that battle cry may be lost on an electorate that could use the opportunity to signal its disapproval at the way things have developed after last year’s election.
Candidates: Simon Busuttil, David Casa, Joanna Drake, Anton Tabone, Roberta Tedesco Triccas, Joe Friggieri, Michael Falzon, Ian Spiteri Bailey
Labour Party
The MLP will be attempting to bring out its Labour vote at all costs in order to guarantee at least two seats in the Socialist bloc within the European Parliament. Its preliminary elections to nominate its candidates were met with controversy within the party: a first round of votes approved four candidates. When a petition called for an additional four candidates to be approved, in a bid to have both a female and Gozitan candidate, none of the female or Gozitan candidates were approved by the Labour general conference. No quotas were implemented, and nominees to the candidatures had to be approved by 70 per cent of the threshold.
Although the Labour Party has refrained from describing the election as a test of no confidence in government, once the result is out, the party is expected to ride on the wave of discontent if this results in a defeat for the Nationalists. However, if the MLP gets less votes than the PN, the party may experience yet another period of internal unrest as Alfred Sant’s leadership comes under the spotlight once again.
Candidates: Joseph Muscat, Glenn Bedingfield, Louis Grech, John Attard Montalto, Robert Micallef, Owen Bonnici, Joe Debono Grech, Wenzu Mintoff
Alternattiva Demokratika – the Green Party
Europarliament hopeful Arnold Cassola is expected to have a relatively good showing for the beleaguered small Green Party. With years of experience working as the secretary-general of the European Federation of Green Parties in Brussels, Cassola may already be well-equipped for the post of eurocrat, however the enormous electoral threshold makes Cassola’s election, already a cumbersome ordeal, a relatively insurmountable one. AD is expected to put forward an agenda based on environmental issues and civil rights, and attempt to ride on the wave of disillusionment with the PN government.
Hunters
The President of the Hunters’ Federation, Lino Farrugia decided to contest the European Parliament elections following the removal of hides from l-Ahrax tal-Mellieha. Farrugia may represent a potential lobby of over 16,000 hunters and trappers, excluding their families. On paper Farrugia’s electorate appears strong. As a preserver of the status quo, Farrugia could find a place for himself within the Europe of Democracies and Diversities, the eurosceptic political grouping in the European Parliament, which also hosts the French hunters Chasse Pêche Nature Traditions (Hunting Fishing Nature Traditions), the Christian-traditionalist ChristianUnion-SGP, Jens-Peter Bonde’s June Movement and the UK Independence Party, which seeks withdrawal of Britain from the EU.
Gozo Independent
Gozitan Victor Zammit’s agenda is purely based on raising the island’s GDP to the level of the Maltese. An economist by profession, Xaghra-born Zammit, nicknamed Tal-Kusi, is contesting as an independent candidate. He is however retaining his right, most opportunistically, to shop for the political grouping or “the party that is most ready to bridge the gap in GDP,” as he announced in his promotional leaflet, where he wrote that the source of uncertainty rests with both parties. He previously wrote that all new investment should be relocated to Gozo, until the GDP per capita is identical for both islands.
With his narrow Gozitan agenda, Zammit is unlikely to be elected, but he may very well hive off important Gozitan votes that can determine who wins the fifth seat.
Men’s Rights Association
Former Labour candidate Emmy Bezzina and John Zammit have been at the centre of the men’s civil rights group since 1990, when the Association for Men's Rights was founded. The pair successfully campaigned for the removal of the impediment of departure used against men in separation and annulment cases in 1995. But the mainstay of the organisation is the introduction of divorce. Now they are appealing for ‘fighters’ for civil rights to vote for them in a campaign which pledges to fight in favour of the emarginated, minorities and discriminated. Bezzina is a vocal anti-cleric who laments the Catholic dominance of the islands. Zammit co-ordinates the Malta-North Korean friendship society, the last bastion of Mintoff’s political flirtations in the eighties.
Imperium Europa
Eccentric Norman Lowell leads a handful of disciples against the scourges of immigration, with his far-right formula of ‘shoot to kill’ at approaching boatfuls of immigrants. He speaks of plans to form a new European political party grouping on the far right which he calls Nova Europa, along with the notorious FPÖ, Jorg Haider’s Austrian Freedom Party. Lowell said he wants to see a genetic programme implemented to downsize the Maltese population to 200,000, which will be sent to live in the Three Cities and Valletta. The rest of the island, he maintains, will become free of post-1800 construction and instead replaced with a utopian vision of flora and fauna, with wild animals roaming the planes. Lowell’s eccentricity is unlikely to land him votes by the droves, even if his anti-immigration stand may find sympathetic ears among sections of the voting population.
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