I must start this article by, again, mentioning San Gwann local council. This labour-led council has recently gone through troubled waters, with interference from higher quarters.

The mayor motioned for his own vote of confidence, voted for himself, a vote that resulted in parity, then voted again through his casting vote.

This is proof that this newly-elected labour administration is incompetent when it comes to running a council. Internal struggles are rife, as they usually are with labour. Therefore, power struggles start and the citizens, who had been lured to vote for new labour, are again the victims.

I have had occasion to visit entire streets in San Gwann and subsequently sent various emails to the mayor on items that his own citizens would like him to consider. Most emails are answered by what seems to be a staple answer, that of saying that the email has been passed to Mr Borg for the mayor’s attention. It does, however, stop there. The mayor does not answer me, nor does he solve or try to solve the problems or queries. The only barking is that against the central government on lack of funds, when, it transpired via my parliamentary questions, that central government does allocate specific funds for weed cutting, and the G.M Camilleri garden, as examples, to the local council.

However the silence is deafening. All along San Gwann streets you get weeds that resemble a hedge. You get traffic signs and parking signs that need to be modified but are left as they were. You get skips in front of households when these are an inconvenience. You get retaining walls not built up as per new open space regulations. You get WasteServ bins badly placed for the residents and for traffic flow. But nobody lifts a finger. I forgot, the mayor did answer these residents – after three months, mind you – telling them “sorry, these bins cannot be removed”. But Mr Mayor, can’t they be put further in from a busy road, and put some trees around them, thus avoiding possible accidents and leaving a pleasing sight rather than a self-made monstrosity?

In Kappara, residents play a game of “spot the sweeper”, and how many days it will take for the garden to be watered, cleaned and pruned. Of course, this competition becomes more difficult in summer, due to the enormous number of foreign students invading this area, and buses, transit vans blocking the roads, noise and confusion abounding.

The result is that the streets are littered with plastic bottles and fast food remnants. Well, Mr Mayor? Any action? You guessed – not a single word uttered. I’m sorry to inform you that there were no prizes allotted for these competitions.

The irresponsibilty of governing with tax payers’ money in this manner is something that is farcical, dangerous or utterly incompetent. Again, I remind you that the higher echelons of the labour party supported the mayor in his vote of confidence.

Well, that is what happens when nationalist voters refuse to go out and vote for the PN. You may like the PN or hate it, but it offers a better solution to the citizen, as it is stable, it goes places, and has not got the internal strife that manifests itself daily in the labour camp.

Gzira is an area I visit regularly and some streets known to the new labour mayor resemble a bomb site rather than a residential area. Complaints of dirt, broken pavements, noise, open inspection chambers, cranes that stay overnight, open sites and litter all over the place are the order of the day. Again, the fresh looking administration failed to deliver after so much pomp and promise. These are the harsh consequences of not voting. Non-voters tend to put the blame on a candidate or on the party, but they will be the first to suffer as a result of their action, pushing us all back to the darker ages of Malta. The more we realise this, the smaller the non-voting portion gets, deciding to cast their vote for the Nationalist Party, as a better solution than Labour for the country as a whole.