Time for Adrian Delia and PN to seek out ‘pale red’ vote, Schiavone says

The Nationalist MP Hermann Schiavone has made a case for party leader Adrian Delia to focus his efforts on southern, ‘pale red’ voters whom he thinks, find the PN “likeable”.

In an interview with MaltaToday after he was reinstated by the party following his auto-suspension from the parliamentary group over a meeting he held with Tumas Group CEO Yorgen Fenech – reportedly the owner of secretive Dubai company 17 Black – Schiavone said the PN had to strengthen its base in the southern constituency.

“We have to consolidate as much as we can of the blue vote: whether it’s ‘pale’ or not. Because most Nationalist voters, across the board, are pale blue anyway... in the sense that it is easy for them to shift their vote.

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“But the point is, if there are a couple of thousand who – and we have to recognise this – will not vote for the Nationalist Party at the next election… we cannot afford not to replace those few with a different support-base.

“There is an entire segment of pale red voters out there, to whom we can reach out. I believe we should; in fact, I believe in this strategy so much, that yesterday I asked Adrian Delia to consider assigning my shadowing duties to someone else, so that I can concentrate on working on the ground in the southern districts to maximise the party’s share of votes... possibly winning for the first time hundreds of pale red voters,” the MP from Marsaxlokk told MaltaToday.

Schiavone also described the vociferous anti-Delia faction inside the PN as a small segment from the party, and that not voting PN will only make the party weaker.

“Delia is a personal friend of mine: he is my party leader; I like him; and all that. But much more than that, I love my party. So, with hand on heart, I can say that… if we are going to remove this democratically-elected leader of ours… what will become of our democratic credentials? That is the message I would like to get across, if I can.

“Even to those who may be against Adrian Delia – who don’t like him, for whatever reason, but still love the Nationalist Party. Not voting PN will make the party weaker; so whoever comes in after Delia, when his time is up, will inherit an even more fractured party. Is this what we want, us Nationalists? Or do we want a stronger party, that can challenge the government of the day? The only way to strengthen the Nationalist Party, is to get behind the only legitimate leader we have.”