[ANALYSIS] Foreign workers, concrete and Muscat: Abela’s three big headaches

There is unity in strength.

This was a hallmark of Labour’s successful political brand in a decade which saw the party vanquish a divided, dazed and confused Opposition. It did so by following to the letter a textbook written by former leader Joseph Muscat, and slightly corrected by Robert Abela, turning Labour from perennial underdog to a natural party of government.

Instead of lashing out against barons and ‘friends of friends’ networks, Labour found itself reshaping the country’s power network, pulling the rug from under the PN’s feet by becoming a business-friendly party while also being more in synch with younger voters’ more secular and liberal outlook.

But with inflation taking a bigger bite from middle-income households in 2023, the last decade’s ‘feel good’ factor which obscured Labour’s inner contradictions, is fast evaporating, bringing new and old divisions to the fore.

And after years of mocking the PN over its disunity and cultivating a brand built around a slick, decisive and strong leadership, Labour seems ill-equipped for a much-needed internal debate that is meant to resolve internal tensions. While it is now clear that the party harbours within it conflicting views on themes like planning, the economic model and the Muscat legacy, there is little debate on the way forward, as party activists and stalwarts still expect a clear direction from above.

And while Labour still leads in the polls by a substantial, albeit reduced margin, there is a growing feeling that Labour is entering a twilight zone, where some of the love invested in the party back in the best of times, is gone.

Photo: James Bianchi

1. Foreign workers: Abela faces a dilemma on how to correct an economic model partly based on population growth, which keeps giving in terms of revenue, but whose sustainability is questioned by his own finance minister

Surveys on public concerns indicate that discontentment on ‘foreign workers’ is greater among older Labour voters than among other categories of voters. This suggests a growing dissonance between Labour’s traditionally hawkish stance on migration, and its newly found cosmopolitan vocation.

This contradiction explains why both Muscat and Abela managed to balance the increased reliance on foreign labour with a bullish stance on boat arrivals, which remain at historically low figures.

But while xenophobia remains rampant, as long as the economic model delivered prosperity, people were more ready to tolerate legal migration’s undesired side-effects. But the balancing act is becoming harder at a time when people are suffering the inflation pinch. Ironically it is this economic model which presently generates the tax revenue that pays the fuel subsidies shielding the population and averting an even greater crisis which may wipe out Labour’s majority.

This exposes the dilemma faced by Robert Abela and his finance minister Clyde Caruana. The latter has been frank in admitting the need to change track, warning that to sustain current rates of economic growth, Malta’s population would have to increase to 800,000 by 2040.

Caruana, himself one of the architects of labour market policies which spurred this kind of growth, now speaks of the need to “transition” towards a new economic model.

But does Labour have an alternative economic model in mind? Once again Labour needs to go back to the drawing board to think out of the box, though it remains unclear whether it can reverse course at the very moment it needs to cash in this growth, to continue subsidising energy bills and keep discontent on food prices from snowballing into an unstoppable wave before the European elections.

File photo

2. Concrete: Abela is risking a popular revolt led by Labour’s own mayors as construction works keep cropping in every nook and cranny. But he is also under pressure not to undermine business confidence in the face of a more determined Opposition

Discontent on environmental issues is the most visible on the social media and the reverberations on Labour are increasingly felt in the public statements made by three popular Labour mayors who participated in the ‘Xebbajtuna’ protest. Communities in Labour heartlands like Zurrieq, Pembroke and Santa Luċija have also become more restless when faced by development on land added to the boundaries in 2006, the assault on townscapes thanks to the reinterpretation of building heights under Labour, and mega-projects undertaken in the past years.

The problem for Labour is that over the past decade it has become too associated with the developers’ lobby, with communities asking the leadership to stop hiding behind the policy smokescreen and declare on whose side they are on. It was this kind of frustration at seeing the authorities facilitating the takeover of part of the Gzira garden to accommodate the relocation of a petrol station, which drove its Labour mayor to the brink.

And while in the Nigret case, Labour was offered respite by the overbearing presence of disliked former environment minister George Pullicino in his role as architect of a project made possible by the extension of boundaries carried out on his watch, one cannot ignore that Labour’s own deputy leader Daniel Jose Micallef had served as an architect of a similar project on an adjacent agricultural site.

In this context, hobnobbing with these lobbies has become increasingly toxic for Labour’s exponents. But while vocal opposition turns social movements like Graffitti into a reference point for those on the left of labour, Abela also must contend with increased restlessness among more silent categories of property owners, who fear greater uncertainty as permits are increasingly questioned and even taken to court for revocation. For one cannot ignore that Labour benefitted in electoral terms from policies that create ‘little rich people’ by selling their land to developers.

Each time Labour moved the planning goal posts by a few inches, it endeared itself with a new category of winners in this never-ending planning lottery. This may explain Labour’s electoral inroads in strategic districts like Gozo, where despite increased opposition to uglification, the party has increased its majority.

And after being paralyzed by COVID-19 and the impact of the war, Abela may be tempted to kickstart the economy by once again pressing the accelerator in his bid to compensate inflation with a trickling of wealth and tax revenues from property projects. This explains why in the face of growing dissent at local level, Abela keeps sending mixed signals on an issue which pits Labourites who shun big business, against acolytes who thrive through connections and deals involving these same interests.

This tension may well create even more uncertainty, as each project is judged based on the opposition it triggers. Instead Abela may opt to change and tinker policies, as he indicated in a speech on 1 May, but that would require yet another balancing act between conflicting pressures.

Joseph Muscat

3. Joseph Muscat: Abela’s silence on his predecessor’s political legacy suggests that he still fears him despite winning a strong electoral mandate on his own steam last year

The greatest of Abela’s current worries may well be the ticking time bomb in Burmarrad, as his disgraced predecessor Joseph Muscat is showing increased nervousness at the PM’s silence on his judicial troubles.

The situation may come to a boiling point in the next months upon the conclusion of an inquiry on the hospital contracts led by a magistrate whose independence is now being vocally contested by Muscat. Muscat’s interview with party stalwart Manwel Cuscieri was clearly a message directed at Abela, that he would directly seek the support of the party’s grassroots if left out in the cold by the party’s leadership.

Abela may well decide that silence and letting the institutions work, is his best course of action. And while that may well be the right course of action with regards to judicial and police investigations, Abela’s authority is being undermined by his political unwillingness to cut the umbilical cord which ties him to Muscat. In the absence of a clear political verdict on the wrongs committed under Muscat, a segment of the party’s grassroots may still feel at liberty to drag the party down by rallying behind a disgraced former party leader, whose presence is now considered toxic by other Labour voters and activists.

Abela’s reluctance may well be shaped by experience, namely Alfred Sant’s rejection of his father’s advice to avoid an epochal clash with Dom Mintoff which effectively condemned Labour to the political wilderness for another 15 years.

Abela may understand the last thing he needs is the emergence of Muscat as a reference point for internal dissent, especially among those still nostalgic for the ‘best of times’. Muscat has so far been prudent, refraining from any criticism of Abela. But this could also be his way of exerting political leverage. Muscat knows that while confronting Abela would be suicidal for him, the very hint that he may break ranks sends shivers down Abela’s spine.

But while a clash with a former leader is damaging, Abela may not be able to postpone the problem indefinitely. He must now be pondering on how to react when push comes to shove, especially if the magisterial inquiry recommends that Muscat is charged.

Abela will need to take back control over the course of events by sending a clear political message that he will not tolerate any internal display of ‘solidarity’ with the former leader. This is after all what voters expect from a political leader elected with a strong mandate of his own.

But strangely Abela still behaves like the party leader who inherited Muscat’s mantle in 2020. One factor weighing on his mind is that events may well explode in his face in the run-up to MEP elections, where Labour’s super-majority could be tested by a PN reinvigorated by the cross-party appeal of Roberta Metsola’s candidacy, after serving in the role of EU parliament president.

But this makes it even more imperative for Abela to act now to avoid a curveball coming his way closer to the mid-term test.