|
A reader grunts and tells me: “You are going to be the cause for the ruin of PN at the polls.” Another reader repeats the same argumentation for the MLP.
Can I say from the outset that my writing job has nothing to do with electing or bringing down governments, or promoting reds, blues or greens? Yes, even greens.
It is not my brief to get political parties elected or dethroned. They are good enough at unseating themselves. You only have to see what all the three leaders of all our political parties do to themselves with their silly statements and ill-timed declarations or meetings.
The fact that I spend more time on the Prime Minister is because he is running the country, not Harry Vassallo or Alfred Sant, or thank God Ignatius Zammit.
The PM has said that he wishes for a fixed-wing aerodrome, and this he declares in the shadow of a helicopter service that has evaporated, which anyone with a smidgen of good sense knew was bound to fail from the outset.
Obviously Dr Gonzi cannot remember the protests against a planned aerodrome in Xewkija. Well, no one seems to have told him who was present for that particular protest on the Xewkija aerodrome at Ta’ Lambert. That was 12 years ago, and since then Gozo has been transformed into a jungle of concrete flats on idyllic promontories still dominated by hundreds of illegal trapping sites.
Much more interesting is the fact that a group of entrepreneurs who wish to start a seaplane connection between Malta and Gozo have their proposal gathering dust in one of the many in-trays in Jesmond Mugliett’s office. Mr Mugliett will of course state that he is a very busy man.
It is quite amazing how the Nationalists manage to turn a negative into a positive. See how they have handled the helicopter fiasco. It is not their fault; they will say that the helicopter service could not attract anyone to fall for the Spanish helicopter company’s Lm50 return ticket. In fact it is no one’s fault. Indeed I am quite surprised they have not blamed Labour or Alternattiva. Yet!
Someone needs to sit down and tell the PM straight to his face that he cannot shoot from the hip anymore. Since his instalment on the throne, he has been whisking off ideas and failing to follow them up or realising that it was not such a good idea after all.
First he had the grand idea for a golf course at Xaghra l-Hamra, only to discover that it was not very possible. Not possible, because none of the hoteliers were willing to fork out that kind of money and because Xaghra l-Hamra is an ecological site.
Then it was the Opera House and his grandiose idea for converting the Opera House into Malta’s Reichstag and that too never materialised. And why? Because he said there wasn’t the money to build it. So why say you have an idea if you cannot realise it?
Then he had this bright idea about islands in the middle of the sea and then wind turbines in the sea. This I have been told is very possible, but so is an igloo in the middle of the Sahara – so is it practical?
These kind of sweeping declarations have an impact on perception. No wonder that they make the parallel that this Prime Minister could be a KMB. Rather cruel I think, but then politics is not for the faint-hearted.
On the other side of the river we have the Leader of Opposition, who has made it abundantly clear he has no intention of creating hurdles in his sober mission to be our next Prime Minister.
But this has been an awful week for Sant. A super bad week for Alfred. At least that is the impression I am getting.
He is definitely surrounded by some very unfaithful party activists. For someone to have informed NET TV that the Dubai delegation was meeting at the Labour HQ is proof that not all is well at Mile End. That there are those who wish to put spokes in Labour’s wheels is certainly not a good sign for Alfred Sant.
The fault is not all his, and as one faithful Sant acolyte recounted, “Sant must be cursed.” But I do not believe anyone is cursed, least of all Sant. And if anyone is cursed it is this country for having to carry these politicians with us till kingdom come.
Do we deserve better? No, they are a reflection of our mediocrity. No one seems to have had the gall to tell Alfred Sant that the contractors gaffe could have been avoided if they had not visited Dubai and resided in the same floor of the same hotel; and if the contractors had not decided to discuss their litigation plans at the Centru Laburista.
Duminku Mintoff has gone to the courts again, probably paying his lawyer from the money he collected from his libel case on the BICAL bank. Is there no one who will advise the man to shut up and get on with counting his money?
Norman Lowell, Peter Fenech, Bertu Mizzi, Louis Buhagiar, Tonio Azzopardi and Dom Mintoff have one thing in common. They have all libelled MaltaToday.
Lowell is the latest addition. Norman Lowell the fascist has taken three journalists from this newspaper to the courts. Defending him is former Labour candidate Emy Bezzina, the loquacious lawyer renowned for his boorish television appearances. The less we mention Lowell, the better, and this libel action is aimed at creating more news attention.
It will not however – it should only serve to explain the dangerous mind of this man, the unbelievable intolerance he preaches and his ugly vision of the world.
In our sister newspaper Illum, which is not a photocopy of MaltaToday and has its own stories, the front page followed the hunting saga at the Ornis Committee meeting. Lino Farrugia, the impulsive hunters lobby representative, has said that the hunting will not end on 20 January as Illum reported.
The question we should ask Mr Lino Farrugia is if he has any other information that he would like to share. The truth is that he does not. He knows that there is no opening date for Spring hunting because the Maltese government does not have a good enough argument to open a hunting season in April and May.
Lino Farrugia knows this and so does George Pullicino, the loggerhead turtle minister. If he is worried that hunters are getting all agitated with himself because of the news, then frankly it is about time Lino Farrugia tastes some of the hunters’ medicine, the same treatment thousands of migratory birds taste every single day of the year, and the same reception hundreds of Maltese families experience when they walk the Maltese and Gozitan countryside.
Lino knows that I am not a fundamentalist and that I have spoken in favour of controlled hunting, but what is happening in Malta has nothing to do with Malta. Hunting the Maltese way, dear Lino, is no longer sustainable. It is passé and on the way out. It is only a matter of time now, Lino.
|
