News • 26 January 2003

Opportunist Sant lets the rabbit out of the bag

The Labour leader has unleashed his new blueprint for the future and with it a last ditch attempt to win over Europhile labourites and undecided voters unhappy with the Nationalist government.
In a letter to the Prime Minister, Labour leader Alfred Sant finally let the rabbit out of the bag and made another massive U-turn.
In his letter sent late on Friday he proposed the referendum be delayed until after the general election. He called on the Prime Minister to consider a referendum after the election as binding. He insisted on a condition that for the referendum outcome to be respected for one legislature the yes or no vote should amount to at least 60% of all the votes cast.
Yesterday, the Prime Minister Dr Fenech Adami reacted to Dr Sant’s letter accusing him of ignoring the fact that the Nationalist Party had a mandate to call a referendum on European accession. He shot down the possibility of an election before the referendum. He also reconfirmed that the referendum would take place in March, which he will announce next Wednesday or Thursday He added the date of the election would be decided by the government in the best interest of the nation.
After months declaring that the election should be binding over the referendum, Dr Sant was back to the game he is best at, U-turns.
In essence Alfred Sant is arguing that although the Labour Party may be against accession, he is willing to respect a referendum that will call for Malta to become a full EU member. He is suggesting a referendum should be held after the next general election and that it should be binding.
The contradiction of being at the same time against, but for something, reached epic proportions in his other U-turn on VAT, where he declared he was personally against VAT but that, as a party leader he had to be reasonable, and think of the common good.
The same warped thinking is now being applied to the question of EU membership.
Last night, PN think tanks were not surprised with Alfred Sant’s latest move, but concerned whether voters would take him seriously or simply take his U-turn as a way forward.
As his new stand reverberated through the newsrooms and beyond, more anti-Europe diatribes were presented to the public with the latest salvo coming from Leo Brincat, the former Finance Minister. Brincat, speaking on the Xarabank styled Robin Hood hosted by former Alternattiva spokesman and former europhile Toni Abela, he said that Malta in the EU would lead to an invasion of foreign lawyers. He conveniently forgot to tell his audience that Maltese law and the use of the Maltese language was not something a foreign lawyer could easily muster let alone handle.
Brincat’s fumbling contrasted with the upbeat performance of Gunter Verheugen, the Commissioner for Enlargement, who during a rather stuffy and rigid seminar organised by the Chamber of Commerce, shot down the false picture presented by the MLP that Malta would only be getting Lm1.5 million yearly.
He did not stop there, he emphasised that the partnership the Labour party was requesting was ambiguous and, if it did get off the ground would surely come with obligations such as the EU’s agricultural policy and no benefits in return.