Talk of rainbow coalition “extremely premature” - Cassola
Matthew Vella
Alternattiva Demokratika chairperson Arnold Cassola yesterday said calls for a red-green coalition such as the one touted by Labour MP Evarist Bartolo were “too premature” with general elections still too far off.
His comment comes after Bartolo yet again pushed for an eventual union of forces between socialists and greens, writing in his regular column in MaltaToday.
Former Nationalist minister Michael Falzon, also writing in his MaltaToday column, summed up Bartolo’s proposal as a way to ensuring a Labour victory in 2013 by leaving no stone unturned. “Bartolo wants to see that nothing that can help bring Labour victory is put by the wayside.”
Speaking to MaltaToday, the AD chairperson said that while AD “shares the idea of working together on common issues with either Labour or government”, it was still too early to talk about a rainbow coalition with Labour.
Only five years ago, the greens and Labour were at loggerheads over EU membership, with Alternattiva Demokratika four-square behind accession and Labour strongly opposing Malta’s EU bid.
“AD has always expressed its will to work with all political forces in the country and work for the benefit of the Maltese people,” Cassola said.
“Talking about coalitions is extremely premature… AD is ready to work with those who share our vision, issue by issue. We have to be convinced also that whoever wants to collaborate with AD works for the improvement of the democratic systems in our country and is ready to promote a system which encourages plurality of opinions in the political arena.”
In his column, Bartolo said there were enough red-green voters in the country, based on the 2008 electoral vote, to give both parties a singular absolute majority in the country with 50.1% of the vote – 1.76% belonging to AD.
As far as the Constitution allows, any sort of alliance of parties would have to present itself under a single-party list, while parliamentary seats would have to be won by candidates in their own districts.
That would still leave AD, so far having never elected a single member, having to work hard to elect a member, an uphill battle that requires 16.6% of votes from one single district.
In the meantime its vote would give Labour an added guarantee for a majority.
Bartolo has written that it was time “to start working seriously towards building a red-green alliance” for the next general election.
But he also expressed scepticism at the enthusiasm for the idea. “So far I see very few signs that the two parties are ready to work together. Within the Labour Party and Alternattiva Demokratika there are very influential people who dismiss the idea of a strategic alliance leading to a coalition government. There is still the mutual fear that if reds and greens were to get together they would infect each other with a deadly virus.”
Fellow Labour MP Helena Dalli took the cue from Bartolo’s column to call for the creation of a ‘historic bloc’ that would be “a bloc of political, social and economic power that captures a wide section from all different sectors of society.”
But former PN minister Michael Falzon poured cold water over the idea after approval ratings in MaltaToday had pushed Labour leader Joseph Muscat ahead of Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi.
“Labour’s way forward cannot be an attempt at creating and leading such a coalition, but to capitalise on the perception that the PN is a spent force and needs to go into opposition to reinvigorate itself, just as the MLP would have been reinvigorated under its new leader.”
And AD spokesperson for sustainable development Carmel Cacopardo goes further, writing in his blog that it is “debatable whether there is a real convergence of thought” between greens and socialists.
“It’s only now that Labour is talking on issued that for years were AD’s exclusive political agenda,” Cacopardo says, referring to Joseph Muscat’s bid to push for a progressive agenda in Labour that includes divorce among other civil rights, and the environment.
“For years Labour never said a word, fearing it would lose votes. Now it is opening its mouth in the hope of attracting AD votes. It’s a matter of pure convenience, and nothing else.”
While Cacopardo’s accusation may sound heavy-handed, he says the call for an alliance comes too late in the day after Labour spent years hindering a real electoral reform that could give small parties like AD, a chance to elect MPs via a national threshold.
Early days
“Evarist says nothing about the fact that Labour agreed with the present electoral system… the constitutional amendments that gave the PN and MLP strict proportionality but ignored the rest happened with Labour’s consent, including Evarist’s vote in parliament,” Cacopardo wrote.
And inside Labour, many insiders see the novelty of an alliance with AD to be far-fetched after having been on totally opposite sides over EU accession.
Back in June, Labour leader Joseph Muscat told AD chairman Arnold Cassola at a meeting inside the Labour headquarters that the two parties were in “political symbiosis” with each other.
While Muscat’s “movement of progressive and moderates” ostensibly involves working with AD as well, invariably there will always be elements inside both parties that will be strongly suspicious of any alliance between Alternattiva Demokratika and Labour.
For years, AD’s pro-European, liberal and ecological agenda clashed with Labour’s strange mix of conservatism and misguided environmentalism.
Now Muscat’s rhetoric indicates a desire to replicate in Malta what he experienced in Brussels, where the democratic left is the heart of the progressive force he wants to herald. It was only in 2007 that Labour started talking of non-traditional families, while for 11 years, a scorned Alfred Sant was determined never to touch upon the thorny issue of divorce after receiving so much flak for it.
Bartolo’s may be a lone voice in the wilderness. As Cacopardo amply shows it, both the greens’ experience after the 2003 referendum and the 2007 electoral talks, shows the general mistrust that lingers inside AD of the big parties who could capitalise on their niche appeal from the disaffected and disillusioned.
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