A defiant Adrian Delia addressed a crowd gathered at the party's club in Senglea on Sunday morning, saying that the "attacks" being published in newspapers were not on him, but on his party, and said that the PN will never be broken - neither from people on the outside, nor from those on the inside.
Backed by a number of high-ranking politicians from the party, such as Clyde Puli, David Agius, Robert Arrigo, Hermann Schiavone, Francis Zammit Dimech and Stephen Spiteri, Delia rallied the people saying that the attacks on him were because certain people could not "accept or stand the fact that the PN is gathering strength by going back to the people", before adding that he would not back down.
The Opposition Leader addressed recent news with regards to the PN's Sliema committee rejecting a vote of confidence in Delia's leadership, saying that the newspaper in question had failed to mention the raft of other local committees that had voted their support for Delia - over 700 grassroots members.
Delia dedicated most of his speech to discussing the government's decision to sell a tract of public land in St. Julian's to Corinthia for the price of €51 million, reiterating what he had said last week. He noted that this area of prime land, 30,000 square metres, will be passed on to a private company without a tender having been issued and that it should, in actual fact, have been valued at €800 million. "Konrad Mizzi is either incapable of negotiating, or he is a thief", Delia said, reproducing a line from last Sunday.
However, a third element was added in today's speech, with Delia saying that it could also be the case that Konrad Mizzi was not the person conducting negotiations, but that it was Prime Minister Joseph Muscat himself who had done these negotiations long ago. "The sole responsibility for this project falls solely on Joseph Muscat", Delia said.
He made reference to a presentation that the PN had been shown on the project, saying that in that presentation they were shown one picture which had two towers on it. This morning however, he had opened the newspapers to find reports that the site will actually hold 12 tower blocks instead.
Delia noted that these were 12 towers being built on public land at the same time as there being 3,200 people without a place to live. These 3,200, Delia added, were merely a number for Joseph Muscat's government. "Joseph Muscat has betrayed all socialist principles", Delia said before guaranteeing fully that a PN government would see that there is no single Maltese or Gozitan left "humiliated" without a roof over their heads.
Delia reiterated his stance on the government's means of improving the economy, saying that while the Church had published a vision for Malta's sustainable development which spans till 2050, the government was still without a long term plan and still inflating the economy through population increase.
"The reality is different to the numbers" however, he said, before making reference to pensioners who could not cope with medical bills and increasing rent prices, and young couples who were both working and still could not afford to buy property. "The country is growing; but the different between the rich and the poor is growing faster", Delia said.
A recent survey published by the Malta Union of Teachers which noted that 87% of teachers had experienced aggression at the workplace and the topic of abortion were also topics of discussion in Delia's speech, with the PN leader saying of the latter that the government was "doing what it does best: working in secret" and that the PN had always "believed in human life" and would protect life from the beginning - conception - to the end.
Labour Party reacts: Delia's attacks on Maltese businesses no better than Simon Busuttil
Adrian Delia used most of his speech today to attack Maltese businesses in the same style that the previous leader had done, the Labour party said in a press release following the Opposition leader’s speech.
Delia had fallen to the agenda of Simon Busuttil by maintaining such negative discourse and in the hope that “Busuttil’s people” don’t turn against him, the statement read.
The Labour Party meanwhile is united behind Joseph Muscat who has, as Prime Minister, attracted record investment that has, over the past six years, improved the lives of Maltese and Gozitan families.