Nation, Pride and Dignity: Borg Olivier and the National Anthem
Joseph M Pirotta
Midsea Books 2016
240pp
Joseph M Pirotta is the well-known historian whose magnum opus is the magnificent Fortress Colony, the history of Maltese political development from 1943 to 1964.
In between writing that definitive work, he has given us this pleasant monograph: how George Borg Olivier, the prime minister who got Malta its independence from Britain, waged a hitherto-unknown war of attrition against the colonial masters on the country's national anthem.
It would have remained an unknown story had not Borg Olivier, by then a party leader on his way out, ostracized by his own party, goaded in Parliament of cosying up to the British, revealed his battle in support of the national anthem and through it Malta's claim to independence and sovereignty.
The author has supplemented the meagre information in this regard with thorough research, especially at the Malta National Archives where, surprisingly enough, one can find ample documentation not just on the Maltese side but also the correspondence that passed between the British Services and the colonial Governors.
Others, like Oliver Friggieri, have written about how l-Innu Malti came to be written and composed a few months after the Sette Giugno riots and the inauguration of Malta's first Parliament, how Dr Albert Laferla, Director of Education, invited his brother-in-law, Robert Samut, to compose the anthem's music and Dun Karm, Malta's national poet, to write the lyrics. Friggieri has analysed the words and found that Dun Karm resolutely chose words derived from the Semitic language to which he added an approach thoroughly based on the Catholic religion.
The newly-born Innu Malti was later given a full orchestration by Maestro Paolo Nani and soon became very popular among band clubs and also theatrical performances.
The author compares l-Innu Malti to four national anthems - the Polish, the Greek, the Indian and the Irish ones and concludes that an essential factor in all is the nationalistic fervour that imbued them.
The Innu Malti soon became very popular, especially when schoolchildren were taught to sing it at the beginning of classes every day. But its popularity did not penetrate the realms of officialdom.
It is important to point out here that the Innu Malti in no way entered the very hot debate between the pro-English faction and the pro-Italian faction then engaged in the 'war of languages'. The three people behind its creation were two solid imperialists, Laferla and Sammut, and Dun Karm, although he had begun his poetic life by writing in Italian, kept away from the language dispute.
None of the parties was an antagonistic to the Innu Malti nor excessively in favour.
Then the war came and the British wanted to keep the Maltese on their side, so they permitted the Innu Malti to be played even on official occasions. And in Parliament, Sir George Borg spoke about an official recognition for the Innu, while ironically it was Ugo Mifsud, the co-leader of the Nationalist Party who suggested holding a new competition for a new national anthem.
Once the war was over, the British cooled in their support of anything Maltese and in particular of the Innu Malti. They sort of downgraded it by calling it the Hymn of Malta rather than the Maltese national anthem and it was given no official standing in official ceremonies.
The Maltese understood what was going on and this became crystal clear on 25 March 1945 when an All Malta eleven football team played against the visiting Hayduk Split team from Yugoslavia in a friendly match at the Empire Stadium, Gzira. The band played the Yugoslav national anthem followed by the God Save the King. The spectators, angered by the omission of the Innu Malti, rose as one and sang the Innu themselves, a scene immortalized in Ruzar Briffa's poem Jum ir-Rebha.
The newspaper Il-Berqa, faithful champion of the Imperialist faction, reported what happened but called the omission of the Innu Malti 'an inexplicable oversight'.
And so it went on. The British resisted with all their might any equalling of the Innu Malti with the God Save the King since the former was not the national anthem.
Enter George Borg Olivier who became Prime Minister on the unexpected death of Nerik Mizzi in December 1950. He strongly believed that Malta's status as a colony did not become it and was demeaning. He insisted that the Maltese possessed all the characteristics of a nation and he set out to defend that status.
Carefully, and with dignity, he defended the status of Malta. In 1953, he was invited as Prime Minister to represent Malta at Queen Elizabeth's coronation but he insisted that Malta must not be grouped with the colonies and the Legislative Assembly unanimously approved a resolution in support of his stand and declared that unless his demands were met, he would not attend. It was only after the intervention of Prime Minister Winston Churchill and of the Queen that the Borg Olivier demands were met.
It is a great pity that no one seems to have studied the whole life of George Borg Olivier and to put his life in a context of his times. At least, the extensive bibliography of this book does not mention any such study.
Time is passing and those who worked close to him are slowly being decimated. I remember him when he was prime minister coming to St John's for the Good Friday ceremony, always on his own. Those years, which should have been the crowning of his political life, were marked by a solitary existence. Then followed a personal tragedy that marked his last years.
In all this, even as those around him defected, he remained calm and respectable. A King Lear figure playing out the tragedy.
He was also stubborn, not one to be led, not even by the church, which he kept at arms' length. It was this stubbornness that led the excitables such as Herbert Ganado, Guido de Marco, Antoine Mifsud Bonnici to leave and set up their own party which was dominated by the church and which soon collapsed.
He was also stubborn when under pressure to change an old and doddery Cabinet with fresh blood prior to the 1971 election. His refusal may have cost him the government.
I remember him at the huge meeting tal-Umbrella at Paola Square in 1971 when he disobeyed the time limit and went on and on, to the anger of the Ganadists.
This monograph says nothing of all this. It tells, with a wealth of details the hidden battle of Borg Olivier with the British colonial masters in defence of the Innu Malti.
As said earlier, the British at first and during the war honoured the Innu Malti but once the war was over and the Maltese were given the George Cross reverted to consider the God Save the King as the only national anthem of Malta whereas the Innu Malti was the Hymn of Malta and not a national anthem.
There would be many occasions where the British Services met the Maltese government and interminable discussions followed on whether the Prime Minister of Malta would be saluted by the first bars of the God Save the King/Queen or by the Innu Nazzjonali.
Borg Olivier was quite adamant - he and his Cabinet did not attend events where the Innu Malti was not given its due.
There were a series of diplomatic clashes, the first being the Coronation Concert, held at the Orpheum Theatre in Gzira on 11 July 1953, with Sir Malcolm Sargent conducting the combined bands of the British Services. Borg Olivier refused to attend despite the mediation by Lord Mountbatten himself.
A comic note relates to the 1954 Queen's Birthday Parade when a mistaken Notes for Spectators was given out along with the invitations stating that guests were not to salute at the Innu Malti. The Maltese were offended when they learned about the disparaging contrast between the British and the Maltese anthems. Governor Creasy tardily ordered a new version of the notes which were hurriedly distributed. At 10.50pm on the eve of the parade Borg Olivier phoned the Secretary of the MIG, the imperial side of the diarchy and announced he would not be attending owing to the remarks that had been made. Along with him no member of Cabinet attended, nor any other member of the Legislative Assembly.
More farce was to follow: Lord Mountbatten had a change of heart and ordered that the British Servicemen were to salute during the playing of the Innu Malti. He too saluted, while the Governor, next to him, did not. The matter became public and was even mentioned in the House of Commons.
Then other events intervened. Borg Olivier lost the election and Dom Mintoff became Prime Minister but three years later he resigned during the April 1958 riots. The Constitution was suspended and Borg Olivier was returned to power after an election heavy with church interference. A Constitutional Conference was held at Marlborough House in July 1963 and on 21 September 1964 Malta became independent with the Innu Malti marking the birth of the new nation.
Still, there was constant bickering between the British and the Maltese with regards to the Innu Malti. And that was when Governor Dorman, who had declared he stood 'four-square' with the Maltese, got the idea of writing to the Queen asking her to decide on this problem. His letter never made it to the Queen and the Governor was informed this was not the way the issue should be handled.
The relations between the British Services and the Borg Olivier government so deteriorated that the British came to prefer to hold their own parade in an army barracks while the Maltese could do whatever they liked at the Independence Parade.
Thus on one and the same day in 1966 there were two parades - one at St Patrick where the God Save the Queen was played and no member of the Maltese government was present and one at Floriana where the Innu Malti was played.
The Innu Malti, also thanks to Borg Olivier's stubbornness, became the national anthem and when the Queen visited Malta in 1967, she was saluted by the RMA band playing the Innu Malti.
Lastly, when the House was discussing the Republican Constitution in 1974, it was Minister Anton Buttigieg who moved that the Innu Malti should not be entrenched in the Constitution. He then goaded Borg Olivier that he was more English than the Queen and it was there that Borg Olivier revealed the hidden battles he had waged in defence of the Innu Malti.
It was all in vain, the Innu Malti lost its entrenched status in the Constitution.