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Kurt Sansone
Ever since the dismemberment of the Gozitan-based Jones Party in 1951, third party politics in Gozo has always been a tricky affair. That is, until the European Parliament election this June when the Green Party candidate polled just over 1,000 votes in the Gozo district alone.
The result was a surprise for the Greens as much as it was for the major parties and building on that success, Alternattiva Demokratika has set up a Gozo regional committee to consolidate its electoral gains.
The creation of the committee amid rising discontent among Gozitans with the way the Nationalist administration is running affairs in the sister island may have prompted the Nationalist Party’s blitzkrieg on Gozo a week ago.
But according to the Green Party Gozo regional co-ordinator, Victor Galea it’s going to take more than a couple of meetings in Gozo by the Prime Minister to rekindle the pride Gozitans had in their once pristine island.
“It is positive to hear the Prime Minister say he wants to give utmost priority to Gozo. We augur he takes the correct decisions but it is pertinent to ask where was Lawrence Gonzi since 1996,” Galea tells MaltaToday.
He describes 1996 as the watershed date for Gozo’s gradual transformation into the neglected and shabby island it is today. “There was this person, who was championed as the person who obtained the highest number of votes after Prime Minister Fenech Adami, and who increased her electoral base despite the widespread grumbling and criticism from all quarters. I sometimes ask myself how come Giovanna Debono gets all those votes when individuals and Gozitan organisations are clamouring for action to be taken to redress the island’s ills,” Galea says.
He insists Gozitans want to be treated by the central administration as a region, where the different needs and realities are tended to in a concrete way. “Unfortunately, the major parties see Gozo simply as an electoral district. The island has lost out on international tourism and now even internal tourism risks taking a nose dive as Gozo sinks into a state of shabbiness that was unknown of up to 10 years ago,” Galea points out.
Another major stickling point is the lack of enforcement or rather justice, which Galea blames on the magic hand of somebody who is always ready to pardon misdemeanors.
“There is growing disillusionment among certain strata of society with the way well-connected people manage to wriggle their way out of compromising situations. When inspectors find out that people who are supposed to be at their place of work are nowhere to be seen, what disciplinary measures are taken? Why is it that certain individuals build without a permit and then manage to get one after the construction would have already started? These are issues that have eroded the Gozitan people’s sense of pride,” Galea says.
He then talks of Chambray. “There is a lack of transparency on government’s part and it is only made worse when even the Opposition remains silent. The Green Party had originally been against the development at Chambray but now in the state it is we expect the project to include a hotel or resort that would create jobs and give the Gozitan economy a boost. It seems the conditions have changed with the sale to a Gozitan entrepreneur and the hotel may never be built. Why have the conditions been changed now? These are the questions that Gozitans are asking and not getting an answer for.”
The Cirkewwa and Mgarr ferry terminals are an inevitable issue to discuss with any Gozitan. Galea tells MaltaToday that the first impression tourists are getting of Gozo is a dismal environment. “Why did government realise that the terminals were unsustainable only now?” he asks.
It is this sense of dejection that has motivated Galea and others to form the Green Party regional committee, which is the first such local committee for Alternattiva.
“During the European Parliament campaign we adopted a strategy that involved personal contact with individuals of all walks of life. It was encouraging to see Gozitans receptive to Arnold Cassola and the Green Party’s core values,” Galea says. “In the Green Party Gozitans can see a new way of doing politics. AD is for sustainable development that creates jobs in Gozo but safeguards the island’s unique environmental and rural heritage.”
Galea says the regional committee has embarked on regular political outreach campaigns to talk to Gozitans and gauge their problems and aspirations. “We want to be different from the other parties. We don’t expect people to come to us. We are going to them without forcing our beliefs on them. In this way we can also transmit the island’s problems to AD’s central committee,” Galea says.
kurt@newsworksltd.com
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