The victor and the vanquished

At this very time last year, in the last week of December, Anglu Farrugia - now Speaker of the House - had already tendered his resignation as deputy leader of the Labour party.  There was a sigh of relief on the fourth floor of the Mile End HQ. In record time they were negotiating with Louis Grech to step into Farrugia's shoes. It was the coup to get rid of 'liability Farrugia'.

I recall watching Farrugia fumble, trip himself and mumble on Xarabank with Simon Busuttil, the newly elected deputy leader of the PN. The image-sensitive New Labour had been trying hard not to push Farrugia as a front-liner, but they knew he had no real appeal and more importantly, he could not handle a debate.

Busuttil was being actively promoted by PBS at the time, and of course the PN. He was seen as a moderate, not excessively charismatic yet still miles ahead of Anglu. Any encounter with Farrugia was expected to propel Busuttil forward.

Anglu's demise was obviously picked upon by the bile brigade, headed by the 'Queen' herself, adored by a small segment of self-righteous, gossiping, spiteful and fickle hardcore PN voters. Of course, Lou Bondì was then still a Nationalist boot-licker and nobody would have imagined to see him on Muscat's side four months later.  Farrugia's forced resignation was perhaps the best way to describe Joseph Muscat's Blairite political make-up.

Farrugia's sparring with Busuttil was like some Don Quixote, both in manner and style, and it sealed his political future. To believe that he made a fool of himself would be a very kind way of putting it. The bad vibes from the Xarabank debate were so intense that Muscat was forced to take a decision. Muscat is no Robespierre but his advisors are.
Farrugia was then seen as a liability, a man who served to generate negative hormonal activity amongst a discerning part of the electorate. So he was decapitated.

Nonetheless, all of a sudden Farrugia became a victim rather than a villain to the bile brigade, but no matter how hard they tried to portray Muscat as a mindless autocrat and Farrugia as a victim of the executioner, Muscat's standing in the polls rose rather than plummeted.  He appeared strong, determined and more importantly willing to replace mediocrity with the snazzy-looking Louis Grech, a sort of darling for a particular, middle-aged English-speaking female audience.

As Muscat considered Farrugia's future there appeared to be a concerted effort from the spin machine to turn the Dalligate affair into a morality booster for Gonzi. Rizzo planned to perp-walk Dalli in to the courts just around this time in Christmas.  And believe me, they would have insisted on incarceration. It would have succeeded had it not been for Dalli's absence from the islands and a sudden illness. And I dare say for our singular and incisive reporting on this case, which I assure everyone came without any gratitude from Dalli himself.

When the electoral campaign kick-started at midnight in January, the difference between the two parties was striking if not startling.  Labour had risen like a phoenix from the ashes, with a sexy look and a youthful demeanour. The PN appeared tired and uncharacteristically slow. It also had an obsession with being negative. To make matters worse, they opted for the longest campaign ever.  It read like a textbook electoral suicide note.

The PN lamented they had no campaign money, because they had been busy running the country - a lame excuse which did not hold any ground - instead accusing Labour of being supported by land speculators and construction. Which, given the twist in fortunes, made everyone think, why is everyone sponsoring the PL and not the PN?

Simon Busuttil still repeats this excuse and argues that Labour had more money than the PN. But there was never any sympathy for the fact that the PN was unprepared for the election or cash-poor. In 25 years, a regiment of political activists in the PN made a feast by capitalising on political patronage and using their influence to improve their personal wealth. Meritocracy was ignored and yet criticism of the 'political apartheid' did not strike a chord with the public when the PN was in power.

Muscat changed all that with his popular battlecry, albeit now sounding like a hypocritical campaign slogan that will promise to haunt him and his party.

Under the PN, hundreds received handsome wages that were far higher than those who enrolled in jobs after a careful selection based on aptitude, qualifications, competence or experience. Political patronage defies all that.

And that same tradition is continuing today, under Labour with the appointment of political lackeys and activists.

Under the PN, party faithful were cared for at the expense of the taxpayer as the party coffers were allowed to tumble into great debt, now estimated to run into millions.

Come, January 2013 and the whole debate was dominated by the oil scandal, but not really reported at PBS by the way, no matter what the former political appointees who ran the station say or have to say. There was no serious debate on the subject on TVAM, run by Pierre Portelli and Joe Mifsud, no debate on Lou Bondì's one sided programme and of course no debate on Joe Azzopardi's Xarabank. The sceptics of course blamed MaltaToday for sealing the fate of the election with the oil scandal.

It was perhaps the first time that hard evidence surfaced and got reported in years and it was an event that every journalist would die to report in his lifetime.

It was a time which brought incredible stress and strain on the media organisation here in San Gwann and the newsroom at the time.

Yes, the impact on the final electoral result was truly determined by this story.  It showed to what extent the rot had propagated.

I recall staring at the documents in awe before I realised that this time round I had irrefutable evidence of corruption, and corruption that would rock the political system. I knew I would be hated by some and loved by others. But I was not alien to the feeling of being despised, so I could live with that kind of pressure.

2013 waved goodbye to the PN but it ushered in a new government which is definitely fresher, more dynamic but nonetheless not shockingly different enough. The PN and Simon Busuttil argue: "It is not the PL who won but the PN who lost." Really someone should remind the PN leader that democratic elections, like cup finals, crown the victors not the vanquished.

And in football whether one wins by penalties, auto-goals or a smashing Rooney free-kick, the most important story to recount is about the winner never the loser. The winner takes all.

Muscat of course came under fire for his handling of meritocracy, or to put it more succinctly, the mishandling of meritocracy. It also attracted more attention because it had been his battle cry throughout the long campaign.

Meritocracy may not be the most important thing to many people. But it is up to the media, which always attempt to be slightly less fickle than the electorate, to be interested in their small patch.

It was an exciting year for the media, but one that left us rather muted and tired-looking.  Perhaps all our adrenaline was taken up in the election campaign, but that hormonal rush will surely return in 2014.

As MaltaToday enters its 15th year, we are sure not to let our readers down with our new projects.