‘MPs are not robots’

In a speech in parliament on 17 June 1998, Fenech Adami described backbench rebellions in which MPs vote against their own government as a "daily occurrence" in other democratic parliaments.

To prove this, he cited the same example often mentioned by rebel MP Franco Debono-backbench rebellions in the House of Commons in the United Kingdom.

"We are not robots, and the Prime Minister cannot turn parliament in to a rubber stamp of his decisions."

But back then, Fenech Adami was extremely critical of Alfred Sant's decision to link the Cottonera marina vote to a vote of confidence - a decision which led to the early election, which Fenech Adami won.

Then opposition leader Fenech Adami questioned Alfred Sant for putting "a pistol on MPs heads" by linking a vote on a yacht marina to a vote of confidence in his government.

"His decision to consider the vote on a motion on the granting a lease on the Cottonera waterfront as a vote of confidence has put a pistol on the head of MPs because he is threatening the house with dissolution," Fenech Adami said.

But despite his caution, Fenech Adami immediately called on Alfred Sant to fulfil his constitutional obligation to advise the President.

In a TV address on 9 June - two days after Sant lost the first vote on the Cottonera project motion Eddie Fenech Adami called on the Prime Minister to "take the country out of the crisis it now finds itself in".

"The only way left for him is to abide to the constitution and go to the president to inform him whether he has a majority in parliament and tell him whether he is able to govern."

The call was echoed in an article penned by present PN leader Lawrence Gonzi, who at that time occupied the post of general secretary.

"Dr Gonzi said it was now crystal clear that the prime minister himself had lost hope of commanding a parliamentary majority... Dr Sant was constitutionally obliged to inform the President on the situation," The Times of 11 June 1998 paraphrased Gonzi as saying. 

In the aftermath of Franco Debono's declaration that he would vote against the government in a confidence vote, Fenech Adami declared that:

"I don't think the president comes into it... the Constitution gives him obligations, duties and rights, but this is not a case where he has to come into it... if there is a vote of no confidence, then naturally the Prime Minister must go to the President of the Republic."

This partly contrasts with Fenech Adami call in 1998 on Sant to "advise" the President immediately after the first Cottonera vote. 

Although Sant unlike Gonzi had lost an actual parliamentary vote, the vote had not been linked to a vote of confidence. Joseph Muscat called on the Prime Minister to go to the president before parliament was even convened.

Still, Fenech Adami - unlike Muscat today - refrained from calling for an election as a way to resolve the crisis.

It was only on 14 June that Eddie Fenech Adami expressed his party's readiness for an election. But he did so cautiously, making it clear that this was not his choice.

"The opposition never wanted to bring this government down because one positive thing the country had was the stability of its governments."