opinion

Look who’s talking

Do we sometimes shoot down the message because we’re not sure about the messenger, asks MIRIAM DUNN

When all hell broke loose last week in the world of constituted bodies, accountants, businessmen and others who think themselves very important, due to some comments made by HSBC chief Tom Robson, which were leaked second-hand in the press, one question came to mind.

Would these enraged professionals have reacted in the same way if the injurious words had been uttered by a Maltese with a extra space high profile?

Privately, many movers and shakers, as they like to be thought of, agreed to an extent with Mr Robson’s words, which may or may not have been misquoted, misinterpreted or distorted – we are unlikely to ever find out since he is choosing to maintain a dignified silence about the whole debacle.

So why the furore when he (apparently) alluded to some of our economic problems?

Critics are saying they are angry that the HSBC chief slammed certain business practices in far too general a manner. Rather than tarring the whole sector with the same brush, he should come out and name the offending companies.

This is a fair point to make, but the reactions still seem a little extreme.

Yes, the comments were generalised. But if there is acquiescence that some aspects of business practices could do with a shake-up, that an element of creativity and collusion takes place in the preparation of some account. And that the system of preparing valuations for properties needs an overhaul (the ‘Kamra tal-Periti’ admitted this themselves in an interview with our sister paper this week). And that the management structures in some companies are not helped by the fact that certain people have to be offered jobs because of their family ties rather than their managerial abilities, then what?

Are we missing the wood for the trees and firing our missiles at the message bearer without really looking at the message?

And, has every speech maker who dared to generalise incurred the wrath of so many writers? Has the Finance minister felt the pressure to name all our tax evaders? Perhaps, but I don’t think he was called to do so in such a rancorous way.

So why was this tone adopted to address Mr Robson?

Because he’s foreign, of course! Even the way that the counter-attacks were worded held hints of an almost manic nationalistic defence, with opinion writers recalling the times of the Phoenicians and so on in opuses that would have done the history books proud.

Mr Robson has probably learnt a lesson that some of us received a long time ago - woe betide a ‘foreigner’ who dares to criticise anything or anyone!

And I’m not just talking about Malta; it is a fact of life that nobody likes having their country, town or village criticised by an outsider.

Quite incongruously, people who themselves slam their home country will immediately rally to defend it if a foreigner dares to say anything critical, even if they secretly agree with every word that is said.

Criticism of any sort brings out extreme feelings of pride and nationalistic fervour in a nation or district, as Mr Robson discovered.

I have witnessed the difference in reactions when a foreigner, often a tourist, dares to criticise something or someone to the locals. They jump to defend whatever it is without even taking the merits of the argument into account.

And when people are really pushed into a corner, unable to defend the indefensible, such as the state of Malta’s roads, or the cost of a beer in London, the proud also have a punch-line they can resort to: "If you don’t like it, leave!"

Of course Mr Robson had an almost impossible handicap to his disadvantage, representing a company which, from the start, was embroiled in controversy. What hope for someone speaking on behalf of a bank projected as the big, bad global giant capitalising on far too good an offer for the local, friendly Mid Med bank?

And the ‘foreign’ label, with all the connotations that seem to go with it, has not so much stuck, as reared is head every time there is an ounce of controversy.

But Mr Robson can be comforted by the fact that he is not the first foreigner to be treated to a tirade of nationalistic wrath by the locals. He stands in line in front of a number of unfortunates ranging from overpaid ‘foreign consultants’ to tourists complaining about hunting and even a ‘Polish-Maltese’ woman who dared to claim that the former police commissioner attempted to rape her. Would Isabelle Azzopardi’s allegations have got the same treatment in some parts of the press if she were Maltese? Just how many references were made to her roots – both those of her homeland and those on her blonde (it’s from a bottle, says Daphne) head?

Some of the foreign consultants deserved the barrage of criticism, but that was because they were inept, not because they were non-Maltese. Many other non-Maltese have had to deal with the legacy of these foreign fat-cats in proving their worth, alongside a (well deserved) backlash to the ‘foreign’s always better’ philosophy.

And the tourists can, as the locals often tell them, always go somewhere else on holiday, although we might wonder about the wisdom of telling them to do so when we look at our three-quarters’-empty hotels and restaurants in what are recognised as being very difficult times.

The bottom line is that before we shoot or at best shoot down the messenger, let’s ensure we read the message. Just because we get prickly about who’s talking doesn’t mean he hasn’t got something worth saying.