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A very stable instability Joseph Muscat’s press conference on Thursday – hard on the heels of a week of parliamentary turmoil – appears to suggest a hasty change of direction by the Opposition leader.Addressing the media at the Labour Headquarters in Mile End, Muscat unveiled 15 proposals to combat corruption, which he claimed his government would embark upon ‘the day after it is elected’. Significantly, these proposals include a reworded reference to a Whistleblower’s Act – promised by Lawrence Gonzi before the 2008 election, but never since enacted – as well as measures to strengthen the Auditor General’s office. Judging by the suddenness of this change in gear, it appears that Muscat may have finally realised that the parliamentary shenanigans we witnessed over the past week had done his party no favours whatsoever. In fact, they served only to cloud over the seriousness of the issue at stake – i.e., the possibility of corruption in the tender process leading to the award of a €200 million contract to BWSC and the environmental concerns stemming from it – and from this perspective, Muscat’s 15 proposals can be seen as a deliberate attempt to force the Auditor General’s report back on top of the national agenda. Like all political manoeuvres, however, Muscat’s initiative last Thursday went beyond its original scope: throwing into sharp focus the true situation currently reigning in parliament at the moment – a situation which has been slightly distorted over the past weeks by the constant wrangling over procedure, and also by the fact that both Labour and Nationalist benches have been keen to stamp their own interpretation of matters onto an increasingly exasperated public. In recent weeks the Opposition has not passed up an opportunity to project the current government as ‘unstable’ – citing rumours of unrest among backbenchers, as well as the evident difficulties experienced by the PN in mustering a parliamentary majority when it matters most. Furthermore, it is evident from the ‘electoral manifesto’ flavour of the press conference itself that the Labour leader is keen to project the image of a government that may collapse at any given moment. In this regard, he is helped by the occasional maverick initiative by backbenchers such as Franco Debono, whose ‘walk-out’ of parliament last November had forced the government to rely on the Speaker’s casting vote (a scenario re-enacted this week, albeit under different circumstances). But the question remains: is the Nationalist government really as unstable as the Opposition would have us believe? And is Joseph Muscat really sensing a possibility that the Gonzi administration may not be able to see through its five-year term? It is tempting at this stage to draw parallels with the parliamentary crisis of 1997-98, which resulted in the collapse of Prime Minster Alfred Sant’s government after 22 months of genuine instability. Then as now, government’s hold over Parliament was limited to a single, precarious seat. But while this had often been the case in the past (the 1971-76 and 1987-92 administrations immediately spring to mind) Sant’s government was also undermined from within by deep-seated ideological divisions over social and economic policy. The political identity crisis climaxed with former PM Dom Mintoff voting against his own party on a motion to which Sant had (perhaps unwisely) tied a vote of confidence. It is for this reason that any comparison with today’s scenario is bound to stutter. Gonzi may indeed be presiding over a fractious single-seat majority, and there may even be serious misgivings among backbenchers over individual decisions such as the Delimara extension project. But as the recent parliamentary brouhaha itself has clearly demonstrated, such disgruntlement has not yet reached critical mass, and cannot be said to directly threaten government’s long-term survival. When it came to the crunch – as it did last Thursday, when a negative result would have hamstrung Government altogether – Franco Debono, like all other reportedly disgruntled MPs, was easily reined in and made to toe the government line. Faced with this scenario, Joseph Muscat’s repeated claims that Gonzi’s government is ‘unstable’ may therefore require a little clarification. Certainly, the Prime Minister lacks the peace of mind enjoyed by his immediate predecessor in this regard, and some of his decisions do indeed reflect a very real sense of unease within party rank and file. But barring any unforeseen circumstance between now and 2013, the prospect of open mutiny now looks very remote. Far likelier is the prospect of three years of intensely confrontational politics, characterised by endless exchanges of barbs and insults in the House, which we can now expect to be constantly reduced to dysfunction by procedural ploys of the kind we observed last Monday. From this perspective, the Opposition’s change in direction last Thursday is a very welcome one. After all, it is in the interest of all concerned – not least, the Labour party itself – that the Opposition stops fantasising about a possible collapse of the Gonzi administration, and instead focuses on the country’s real and serious problems of mismanagement and unaccountability. Any comments? |
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Managing editor Saviour Balzan | Tel. ++356 21382741 | Fax: ++356 21385075 | Email
Managing editor Saviour Balzan | Tel. ++356 21382741 | Fax: ++356 21385075 | Email