Indipendenza ‘Lil din l-art ħelwa’

20 September 1964.

11:59pm in Floriana.

Major Alfred Cassar Reynaud stands at the base of a flagpole in the Parade Ground, which had been renamed Independence Arena for the night. Today, it’s a car park.

It had been 90 minutes of parades and dancing. Brawls had broken out between PN and PL supporters, broken apart by mounted police who trampled over several women as they dispersed the crowd.

Then, suddenly, the British national anthem began to play.

From the bottom of the flagpole, Major Cassar Reynaud watches as the Union Jack slowly descends to the ground.

A crowd of 100,000 falls silent.

The lights are dimmed. The music stops.

Cassar Reynaud had only seconds to get the Maltese flag, freshly painted red and white, to the top of the pole. A shiver ran down his spine.

Then, midnight.

Now the 21st.

The bright lights flashed back on. Cassar Reynaud knew he had made it when the crowd erupted into cries of “Viva Malta Indipendenti.” Among them was a 16-year-old boy, swept up in what he would later remember as a “contagious, overwhelming happiness.” He joined the chants as church bells rang across the island. It was a full moon.

Peter Apap Bologna watched the fireworks from the roof of the Phoenicia Hotel, crying with pride as the Maltese flag rose over Floriana. Beside him stood Roger Strickland, nephew of former prime minister Gerald Strickland, who was also crying.

Apap Bologna turned to him, under the assumption that they were crying for the same reason. Then, Strickland shuddered: “This is the saddest day of my life.” Apap Bologna had been mistaken.

The national anthem, Malta’s national anthem, echoed through the limestone streets. It was not the first time the song had been heard, but it was the first time it was truly ours.

In 1922, the Director of Elementary Schools wanted a hymn for Maltese schoolchildren to sing. The melody came first. Dun Karm Psaila was then asked to give it words.

What he wrote was a prayer: “To this sweet land, to the mother who gave us her name…”

Over 40 years later, when it played in that now-car park in Floriana, something had changed. Article 4 of the new Constitution now declared it the National Anthem of Malta. But it had belonged to the Maltese long before the Constitution said so. Ships anchored in the Grand Harbour lit up the dark waters.

Ship decorated for in honour of Malta’s independence (Photo: Peter Sibbald)

On land, the roads stretching from Valletta towards Mdina were lined with trees draped in fairy lights. The same kind you see hanging over your street during the festa. Well, probably an older version, with a few more toxic chemicals. But close enough.

Large trucks tore down the main roads sounding their horns. The same way they do after an election. Some things never change.

Dom Mintoff, together with the rest of the Labour Party, was absent from the event after deciding to boycott a night which, in their view, celebrated a “sham independence.”

You see, independence for Malta was about a lot more than kicking out the British. It was more existential than that. For Maltese people living through the events leading up to 21 September 1964, independence was about deciding how they wanted to define themselves.

Who was Malta going to be as a nation?

That’s a pretty big question for a tiny island that had spent centuries in the shadow of empires.

Valletta shops covered in pro-independence signs sometime around 1964 (Photo: Marine Photo Service)

Labour’s decision to boycott was not about opposing independence itself. That much had already been decided. In fact, you could say it was one of the few things PL and PN agreed on. However, there was a limit to that consensus.

Where the two parties split was over the terms of that independence or, more specifically, Borg Olivier’s proposed Constitution.

It’s safe to say that Mintoff was not a fan of Borg Olivier’s write-up. In his view, the prime minister’s proposals left out six crucial points:

1. Separation of Church and State
2. Civil marriage
3. Ending Church control of censorship
4. Freedom of conscience without religious preference
5. No special legal privileges for the Catholic Church
6. Not rule out violence when defending your rights

Pretty sick for the 1960s, aren’t they? Borg Olivier did not agree, and neither did 54% of voters. And so, the PN’s Constitution went through.

As midnight approached, Labour flags flew at half-mast outside the party’s offices. Mintoff and other demonstrators were dragged out by police as crowds gathered for the flag-raising ceremony.

“Is this democracy?” Mintoff is recorded shouting as police officers carried him away.

But the Labour Party was not the only group unhappy with the terms of independence.

Two Gozitan brothers, John and Paul Portelli, went quite a bit further. They sent a letter to the British Colonial Secretary requesting that, if Malta became independent, Gozo remain a British colony.

It didn’t.

Anyway, the celebrations continued through the night and well into the morning, which must have been rough for Borg Olivier. He still had to go back to the Independence Arena to meet Prince Philip.

The prince arrived and, standing before a crowd of thousands, handed Borg Olivier the constitutional instruments of independence.

Borg Olivier takes them.

He raises the papers up into the air, and turns them outward to face the crowd for them to see.

A photographer found tucked away somewhere is very worried that his camera wasn’t going to work.

Prime Minister Gorg Borg Olivier holding the constitutional instruments in the air (Photo: DOI)

It did.

Behind Borg Olivier sat his 18-year-old son Alex, together with his mother and sister. Decades later, Alex would remember the smile on his father’s face. He had never seen him happier.

21 September 1964.

4:30pm in Valletta.

Prince Philip, the photographer from earlier, and Prime Minister Gorg Borg Olivier are outside the Grandmaster's Palace for the unveiling of a plaque commemorating Malta’s independence. Yes, the same place you stumble home from on a Saturday night. It was sunny.

Prince Philip reaches for the ribbon. The Maltese flag covering the plaque falls to the ground.

Borg Olivier bends down and picks it up.

The photographer raises his camera.

It works.