Saviour Balzan on Sunday

Why Republicanism is such a darn good idea

Saviour Balzan reveals his passion in his special promotion for the Queen’s Golden jubilee

Gulaam Noon is an Indian who specialises in ‘ready made’ meals. He is also a millionaire.

He donates money, a lot of it, to the British Labour party. Yesterday he was knighted by the Queen and became Sir Noon.

This knighthood, part of the fast track honours for British Labour party sponsors is made possible by an age old tradition that monarchs in the former empire bestow to their loyal subjects.

Knighthoods are a new trend in Blairite politics and an old habit in British democracy that reconfirms patronage as an integral part of British politics.

The English monarch, Queen Elizabeth the second, has no empire but a horde of Castles, Palaces, summer houses and estates paid for by the unfortunate English tax payers.

She would have by now knighted many others including another Labour party donor, Lord Sainsbury and the rock star former drug abuser and ‘cannot see a woman and sleep with her’ the one and only Mick Jagger.

This year is of great significance to most English folk, because their Queen celebrates her golden jubilee.

Which makes us wonder why we should make a fuss if our President, Profs De Marco puts a little bit of prepotence in all his public appearances.

The Queen is an anachronism and what she generally stands for is far far worse. She is not an elected person. She has no empire and the commonwealth she heads has seen more tyrants, dictators and madmen than the Biography channel.

Those who cherish the British Royal family have little respect for history or worse still no respect for the legacy of colonialism, the one that changed the boundaries and borders of tribal lands, language, religion and culture.

This does not mean that today we should not respect the Queen, her family and the country she has come to symbolise, but it stops here.

Malta still suffers from the errors of our colonial masters. As colonialists their first job was the realisation of a greater empire and sustaining the image of Greater England.

In doing so, they managed and acted swiftly to keep the natives, yes us, happy or somewhat subdued.

They did this by promoting the Maltese Catholic Church allowing it to progress and develop as the Church the world over declined and faded away.

The ploy with the Church was not about tolerance but about balancing one power that of the clerics against the ruling class and budding political masters.

They promoted the Maltese language against the Italian language, the lingua franca of the professionals and the merchants.

They even tolerated the Maltese treatment to animals, even though they had not allowed such acts in their other colonies or back home.

So long, as the natives were happy, was the motto.

However, they did take nature conservation ‘seriously’ in 1911 when they made it unlawful to catch a cock Robin. But only because some old Brits were shocked to see the poor little creatures in a trabokk.

As good colonialists they had a passion for the good life, they constructed extensive dwellings for their officers in the most picturesque of sites.

They took over former palaces turned them into their offices and transformed old fortifications into modern day forts.

Yet, they left the infrastructure in many villages and town cores untouched and when work did take place it was linked to the military that lived here or to their bases.

They acted to avoid distress too.

When some overdressed English ladies appeared annoyed at the cave dwellers at Ghar il-Kbir off Buskett, English soldiers whisked them away out of the caves which they had been their home for hundreds of years.

All the excitement for the Queen and her country in this small nation is misplaced if not passé.

Her historic role, her meek unremarkable voice and her penchant for saying nothing of great significance inspires her countrymen to adore her but it says nothing for me and countless other Maltese.

Thank fully for most of us, the Golden jubilee celebrations were not an event.

What is needed now, is talking to our children and instructing them in the truth game that dominated the last 200 years of Maltese history … without the frills and lies please.