The local council election result was just that: a local council election result. Not a full-dress rehearsal to a general election.

There were local issues involved and this time they were devastatingly effective at places like St Venera where a young MLP team first swept the old MLP team out and then the PN majority (Meanwhile, has anyone asked how much has this reversal been accountable by the justified decision taken by the government last year to stop the letting off of petards from near the Regional Road?). And at Dingli, the young candidates’ enthusiasm on both sides, swept aside the old established councillors.

Yet no local council election in Malta is ever completely local, whatever efforts the government made before or after the debacle to classify it as such.

On the very core issue that the PN created for itself this past election, the decision not to contest the election at Zejtun and Marsa, there are very few PN supporters who can understand this let alone support the decision. It gave a massive twist to the election itself and if people, to use Dr Tonio Borg’s not altogether felicitous description, “voted with their feet”, one major reason for this must have been the crossed lines emerging from this indefensible PN decision.

Was it more a PN defeat than an MLP win?

As shown in a table produced by our sister daily, it is true that the turnout percentage dropped from 72.37 per cent to 67.3 per cent but in real terms the difference between the votes cast in 2002 and this time was of 240 votes MORE this time. The reason is that eligible voters decreased by 5,628 over three years.

While Alternattiva Demokratika votes remained exactly the same, and independent votes decreased by 924, MLP votes increased by 2,600 and PN votes decreased by 1,907 votes.

So it does not seem that PN voters “voted with their feet” by staying at home. It is even more plausible to say they voted with their feet by crossing over to vote MLP.

On percentage terms, the PN lost four percentage points and MLP increased its share by five percentage points. The PN gained a councillor at Dingli but lost six councillor seats. It also lost its majority at Dingli and Mqabba (at least in seats) and did not gain the expected win at Mellieha where it did even worse than last time and the former independent candidate, who this time was roped in, got less votes than last time.

Thus far, this explains that the local council election was considerably influenced by national issues and was an MLP win, rather than a PN defeat.

Faced with this second drubbing at the hands of the much-reviled Alfred Sant, prime minister Lawrence Gonzi reacted in an understandably hurt manner on Sunday, but he must not be allowed to get away with no one pointing out the dangerous flaws in his reasoning.

Mainly, there was nothing in his words on that day and all through last week, that expressed some kind of repentance, of understanding what the country was telling its government and a promise to amend. (This is Lent, after all!). On the contrary, the usual arrogance came through: we know we are in the right, we have been defeated for having taken ‘responsible decisions’ and we will continue working with all determination (transl. we will doggedly continue doing what we have been doing).

In reacting in this manner, Dr Gonzi has now emerged as a very worrying factor not just to many of his supporters but also to the country at large.

The essence of a democracy is to allow the people to express their opinion regarding the way in which they are being governed. It is thus of the essence of a democracy that the will of the people must always be respected and obeyed. You cannot say the people were misled or bribed (as many MLP speakers say of the last election). The people, like customers, are always right.

The introduction of local council elections, while indubitably an annual bore and waste of time, should also serve as a timely warning to the party in government. It shows far better than through a poll what the people are feeling. To say that the government was being blamed for the ‘responsible decisions’ it took is equivalent to saying that the electorate is collectively stupid and corrupt and that only the government is right.

On the contrary, it is far more plausible to conclude that the people, the electorate, turned their thumbs down on the government for its ‘irresponsible decisions’ such as the Dar Malta madness, the gas fiasco, and the whole thrust of the Budget. Faced with an ever increasing cost-of-living and inflation, an anorexic take home pay and a quality of life that is deteriorating and has never really become better (suffice it to say the former prime minister used to speak about mobile phones as embodying the ‘leap in the quality of life’ he used to promise!), a country in shambles, a country now full of wardens, enforcers, and authorities all falling over each other to clobber the small man, is it any wonder the electorate has given the strongest possible warning to the government?

It is indeed very worrying to hear the leader of the government promising more of the same and vowing to go on as if this was a mere fleabite, instead of coming clean and vowing to listen (really listen this time), and to change where needs to be changed, and to deliver in reality instead of in spin.

Already a year ago, on 12 June, the writing was on the wall. Nine turbulent months later, the writing is again on the wall and in much more clear terms. The real deaf, goes a Maltese saying, are those who do not want to listen.