Manifesto battle: PN says tardiness shows lack of vision, PL says party turmoil leads to errors

Labour and Nationalist candidates continued taking pot shots at each other over their respective manifestos during a Broadcasting Authority debate on Wednesday evening.

PN candidates Julie Zahra and Ivan J. Bartolo went head-to-head with PL candidate Jonathan Attard and Home Affairs Minister Byron Camilleri in a televised debate on TVM forming part of the election schedule.

The PN candidates insisted that the Labour Party's inability to produce a manifesto as yet showed lack of vision. On the flip side, Attard and Camilleri said PN wasted five years on motions of no confidence to then publish a manifesto laden with mistakes.

“In the previous elections, the PL had a vision but now it doesn’t, as it has not yet published its manifesto,” Zahra said.

Camilleri hit back: “Next Friday we will be publishing the electoral programme but it will not contain mistakes. If you did not waste five years on the no confidence votes, you would have had an error free manifesto by now.”

The retort from Bartolo was that the PN published its manifesto early to allow for scrutiny and debate. “We are sitting for an interview with the Maltese, and we are there to listen,” Bartolo said.

Sticking to the party line, Attard poked fun at the revisions of the PN’s electoral manifesto, saying he lost count on the number of versions published. He also touched upon the rent subsidy proposal by PN, saying the three-year tapered system would lead to homelessness.

Zahra said the PL was only creating spin and rubbished claims that people were going to miss out on subsidies. “This is a lie and part of a spin put forward by the PL. You have no ideas and you are trying to scare people off,” Zahra told Attard. 

She also took the opportunity to take a swipe at Equality Minister Julia Farrugia Portelli over her comments on Zahra's Eurovision past, saying the comments were disrespectful to art and culture. Zahra did not let go of Farrugia Portelli saying, "the government that spoke of mechanisms during the pandemic, let people die."

Farrugia Portelli had infamously appeared on a BBC interview in the summer of 2020, promoting Malta for the summer holidays, by repeatedly saying Malta had the right “mechanisms” in place. AT the time she was tourism minister.

Zahra also said promises were not kept on the environment and critisised the infrastructure projects that "lead to more traffic in the southern area of Malta, with roads flooding with every little bit of rain."

She said the Labour government created wealth for the “friends of friends”, mentioning the Justyne Caruana – Bogdanovic scandal. “You awarded a contract to someone with no experience in education.” 

Camilleri stated the PL government took decisions in the best interest of people during the previous years and safeguarded jobs. 

“We showed strong leadership skills and we took decisions during the pandemic that helped people and contributed to a better country,” he said. 

Camilleri took a dig at Ivan J. Bartolo by calling him the protagonist of the no confidence motion in former PN leader Adrian Delia. "Mario Galea also spoke out about his life being made miserable by party insiders. Don’t let them divide the country and make life miserable for the Maltese," he cautioned viewers.

In reaction Bartolo argued that the Labour Party is the one that is divided, mentioning the resignation of former prime minister Joseph Muscat and the various Labour ministers that got the sack.  

Emulating the latest PN trend, Bartolo waived the PN manifesto and said the party laid down a vision for the next eight years. He said his party was the one that introduced economic pillars like financial services and i-gaming in Malta, adding that it is now proposing 10 new ones. 

“The Labour government failed in the only industry it introduced, block chain. Thanks to the PL businesses and professionals have to deal with added bureaucracy and due diligence costs, following the greys listing by FATF,” Bartolo said. 

“Malta needs a new direction, new industries and it needs to create good quality jobs. The country needs a PN in government with a proper vision for the country,” Bartolo said.

Attard said the PL was the party that created good and introduced new civil rights that “gave dignity and provided opportunities to the Maltese”. “PN on the other hand was the party that lead us to excessive deficits and expensive utility bills.” 

Attard said PN was proposing measures full of “terms and conditions”, saying most incentives were subject to conformity with certain criteria. PN’s manifesto provides incentives to individuals and businesses, subject to conformity with ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) principles.

Bartolo defended these schemes, saying PN was proposing less taxes for businesses that acted responsibly. 

Camilleri, being the Home Affairs Minister, spoke of unity in the country and said he was very proud to be Maltese, inferring to the infamous declaration by Bernard Grech that he shied away from admitting he was Maltese abroad. 

Bartolo also referred to patriotism in his closing remarks, appealing for votes to his party for the good of the nation. “I believe that with your Maltese flag in hand, you will vote for your country.”