“I am worried because the person who is presenting himself to lead the country for the next five years is failing to reveal his vision for the country."

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi expressed his concern about Opposition Leader Joseph Muscat during a dialogue session held in Siggiewi’s main square this morning. He was given a warm welcome on his arrival by the large crowd present.

Dr Gonzi called on Dr Muscat to reveal what changes he was going to make in the tourism, IT and education sectors, among other sectors.

“If you are going to leave things as they are,” Dr Gonzi said, referring to Dr Muscat, “don’t bother to try leading the country and leave the PN to continue to do that job.”

Dr Gonzi said that after having read an interview in a Sunday paper with Dr Muscat, he was stunned because he realised that the PL leader hadn’t understood the government’s concept when it intervened in Sea Malta among a string of other restructuring measures taken by the government.

Dr Gonzi once again warned the electorate to be highly cautious on deciding who should be trusted to lead the country in the next five years.

He highlighted that the PN is determined to prevent the country from ending up in the same way as Ireland had ended up. He added that the PN managed to introduce a string of benefits during the global financial crisis, over-riding the crisis.

"Let alone what we can do without a crisis standing in the way,” Dr Gonzi added.

Experts recently stated that there was no link between cancer and the Delimara power station's emissions.  Dr Gonzi once again called on Dr Muscat to make a public apology for having stated that the emissions emitted from the plant were causing cancer and asthma in the south.

On job creation, Dr Gonzi said that the PN will create an additional 20,000 jobs over the next five years.

Prior to Dr Gonzi’s address, PN deputy leader Simon Busuttil said that the only party that can make the country emerge the best in Europe is the party that put forward Malta’s application to join.

He added that Dr Muscat was now happy to work with the EU when he worked so hard to prevent the country from joining in the first place.

Fair Competition Minister Jason Azzopardi said that it was vital to maintain strong finances. He said that a number of schemes were introduced by the government, such as the MicroInvest scheme, and which was highly welcomed by businesses, the schemes of which were introduced thanks to the country’s strong finances.

Referring to Labour’s promise of cutting down on bureaucracy and introducing something similar to the one-stop-shop initiative, by appointing a commissioner to oversee and reduce bureaucracy, Dr Azzopardi said that this already exists and was introduced by the present administration, adding that the PL leader was failing to emerge with new proposals in this respect.

Quoting an excerpt from the interview with PL leader Joseph Muscat in a Sunday newspaper, Dr de Marco meanwhile said that after having read the article, he’s come to realise that Dr Muscat hadn’t a clue about tourism.

Dr de Marco said that last year a total of two million visitors had come to Malta however this didn’t come by chance. This was through overseas advertising and the introduction of the national carrier's new destinations.

Under a Labour administration, Dr de Marco said that the country’s sea was filthy whereas now it’s among the cleanest. He added that last year, 12 cruise liners had entered the Gozitan port, one of many initiatives to help enhance tourism in Gozo.

Finance Minister Tonio Fenech said that Dr Muscat had strongly defended Alfred Sant’s politics which had seen the country drowning in debt due to the wrong decisions taken in the short time span of 22 months when Dr Sant was Prime Minister between 1996 and 1998.

He added that it was always Nationalist administrations who had the best track record in maintaining the country's strong finances and the electorate couldn’t trust anybody else in administering the finances accept the PN.