Looking forward 2026 | Year of great expectations

Who would have thought in 2018 when the World Cup 2026 host nation was chosen that the summer tournament would end up being co-hosted by three ‘warring’ parties?

Roll forward eight years and under a second Donald Trump presidency the US has declared a trade war with Canada and an immigration war with Mexico. And yet, for almost six weeks in June and July these three countries will have to put on a straight face as they jointly host the FIFA World Cup.

There are great expectations for the football tournament, which is the largest ever with 48 teams from around the globe, including the Caribbean minnow island nation of Curacao.

Undoubtedly, the geo-political situation makes the 2026 tournament a political event in as much as a sporting event. That Trump will use the US’s numeric advantage—it will host many more games than Canada and Mexico, including the final—to steal his neighbours’ limelight is a given. What will have to be seen, though, is whether this will also take the form of political jibes that could taint the maple syrup or sour the guacamole.

Whatever the outcome, there is little doubt the World Cup will be one of the big events shaping 2026 with football giants battling hopeful countries as they vie for the coveted trophy.

On a smaller scale but with big domestic significance, the football world will be the backdrop of a different kind of great expectation. On 26 and 31 March, the Maltese men’s national football team will play a double-header against Luxembourg in the UEFA Nations League play-offs. If Malta wins it will gain promotion from Group D to Group C in the forthcoming tournament, a feat that has eluded the country since the European league started being organised in 2018.

There is great expectation among football fans that Malta could finally break the ice and win promotion. And in the midst of this, we can anticipate politicians taking advantage of the patriotic hype to post selfies in the stands at Ta’ Qali National Stadium.

For Malta’s political parties, 2026 will also be the year in which they start gearing up for the general election.

Borg’s test

With Prime Minister Robert Abela emphatically ruling out a March general election, or for that matter, an election in 2026, the country will go to the hustings on the fifth and final year of this administration in 2027. This means that the new year will be characterised by a gradual escalation of political heat.

Alex Borg will get his first real test in 2026. The Nationalist Party leader will have to cement his leadership by vocalising his vision for Malta and ensuring that the team around him is pulling the same rope.

There is great expectation around Borg’s leadership—he took the PN and the country by storm last year to become the youngest-ever leader of a political party in Malta. But 2026 will be a make-or-break year for him personally and the party he aspires to lead to election victory.

Similarly, 2026 will be a watershed moment for Robert Abela’s administration. The prime minister will try and capitalise on budget measures, intended to leave more money in people’s pockets, which start taking effect in the first quarter of the year. Parents will receive an improved paycheque by the end of January when the first tranche of a three-year tax cut will start being felt. But the financial aspect will only represent one part of the story, albeit a very important one.

Abela’s decisions

In 2026, Abela will have to decide whether he wants to pursue the controversial planning reform against a backdrop of growing disquiet in Labour Party strongholds on the chokehold of incessant development that does not respect local sensitivities.

Tangible steps need to be taken to start realising the national park plans for Manoel Island, White Rocks and Fort Campbell. There will be anticipation as to how the Manoel Island contract between MIDI plc and the government will be dissolved and whether this will include trade-offs or indeed, some indecent proposal.

The prime minister will have to decide on a concrete roadmap for a mass transport system unless this is permanently scrapped. He will want to avoid another glitzy roadshow on election eve that leads nowhere, while showing results on the more immediate solution of using fast ferries between coastal towns.

He will have to show tangible progress on health infrastructure that fell by the wayside while Malta lost time with a botched public-private partnership deal with Vitals and Steward Health Care. Abela will have to decide whether the Magħtab incinerator, crucial if Malta wants to move away from landfilling, is going to get out of the tendering stage in which it has been stuck for years.

Some of these decisions could impinge on the mood of different communities or people with shared interests, making them particularly touchy in the run-up to a general election. Nonetheless, there is great expectation as to how Abela will navigate 2026 amid growing unease in the electorate with an administration that is showing signs of arrogance. The prime minister will undoubtedly want to appear statesmanlike when he rolls out the bold Vision 2050 this year—it will serve as a blueprint for the electoral manifesto.

But Abela will also want to translate his superior trust rating in polls into something tangible for his party, something that will also depend on other factors outside his control.

Yorgen and Harbinson

And one of the major events outside the administration’s control that could be happening in 2026 is the trial by jury of Yorgen Fenech. The businessman, who is out on bail, is accused of masterminding the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia. He has denied the charges.

There is great expectation for Fenech’s jury, which will bring a close to the series of criminal cases against those charged with involvement in Caruana Galizia’s assassination. But the expectation will transcend the mere details of how the journalist’s murder was planned and executed, or how the defence will frame its arguments.

Fenech’s high-profile jury will undoubtedly have political ramifications and Abela’s administration will be on tenterhooks, since it could rekindle in people’s memories the protests from 2019, when Fenech was arrested, prompting the subsequent resignation of then Prime Minister Joseph Muscat.

But the courthouse will also be a place of great expectation in the Vitals corruption case as the prosecution will have to decide how to proceed in the absence of its key witness, Jeremy Harbinson. The latter is a forensic accountant, now retired, who was contracted by the Vitals inquiring magistrate as a court expert.

Harbinson co-ordinated the exercise that led to a 1,200-page inquiry report, which provided the basis for prosecutions against former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, his Chief of Staff Keith Schembri, ministers Konrad Mizzi, Chris Fearne and Edward Scicluna, and many more individuals and companies.

But Harbinson’s unprecedented refusal to testify has left the prosecution in a bind and in 2026 all eyes will be on them as to how they will proceed with the cases. The prosecution can rely on other experts, who have testified and the evidence collected in the inquiry but there is no doubt that their life has been made more difficult by the court expert’s intransigence.

Gaza and Ukraine

The new year will also bring with it hope and trepidation over the situation in Gaza and the Middle East. Unless, the lives of ordinary Palestinians improve, the Gaza Strip risks descending again into violence and chaos. The US must not allow Israel’s radicals in government to call the shots—they are not interested in a just peace but domination and exclusion—and the EU must use its diplomatic and economic largesse to push for a civilian Palestinian leadership in Gaza that is an integral part of the Palestinian Authority, while holding Israel to account for flaunting international law.

Achieving a lasting and just peace may be a pipe dream with Israel governed as it is by Jewish radicals and a Palestinian Authority in deep slumber. Yet, the proof of the pudding is in the eating and there will be a lot of that in 2026, starting with the creation of the UN-mandated Board of Peace.

Similarly, in Ukraine, there is great expectation for a negotiated peace to finally take hold after almost four years since the Russian invasion. Much will depend on whether Vladimir Putin has exhausted his appetite for warmongering and whether Volodymyr Zelenskyy will agree to losing control over Ukrainian land with a future yet to be decided. Any settlement will have to include security guarantees for Ukraine and a clear path to EU membership. The big question that 2026 will unlikely provide an answer to is whether Putin can be trusted to stick to a peace deal.

AI and war

Meanwhile, in the new year, we will continue to marvel at the potential of artificial intelligence, whether this manifests itself in a good or a bad way. AI will get better in 2026, become an intrinsic component in operating systems, help scientists make breakthroughs in medicine, will replace chatbots to provide a more human-like experience for customers of large companies, and increasingly replace more jobs. There will be winners and losers in this transformation and legislators will be challenged to set ethical boundaries and rules to regulate the sector.

One of the bigger dilemmas is the use of AI for warfare. While it may still be too early in 2026 to see AI-powered robots primed with weapons on the battlefield, there is little by way of international agreement to serve as a benchmark as to what is acceptable and not. UN Secretary-general António Guterres and Mirjana Spoljaric, President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, have called for a new international treaty setting out specific prohibitions and restrictions on Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems (LAWS). They have called for the conclusion of negotiations on this treaty by the end of 2026 but despite the great expectation to rein in LAWS, much will depend on whether the global appetite for cooperation will pick up.

Gravel and grass

From football to politics, and global conflict to high-profile court cases that are expected to shape 2026, there is an issue, of a comparatively petty nature but very telling of the political mood, that will not go away in the new year. Indeed, it may even be the greatest expectation of 2026—whether the grass will return to the Ta’ Qali picnic area.

After Jason Micallef’s self-imposed December deadline lapsed uneventfully—the picnic area remains an expanse of white gravel despite the rain—many will keep asking whether the €300,000 spent on gravel to ‘help’ the grass flourish was worth it. More significantly, perhaps, is the expectation of an apology from Micallef for bungling the whole affair. But that may be one ask too far in 2026.