Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi, who has only recently completed his first year in charge of the cockpit at the Auberge de Castille, assumed the office of prime minister by succession, following the resignation of Dr Eddie Fenech Adami.

Before that, he had rather limited ministerial experience. His first ministerial appointment goes back to l998, when the PN was returned to office after the MLP’s short-lived, 20-month reign. For Dr Gonzi, this was neither an impediment nor a restraining factor.

Within a few weeks of his taking office at the Auberge de Castille, his Minister of Finance, John Dalli, who was one of the most experienced and the weightiest of his team, tendered his resignation.

Undeterred, Gonzi took over the Finance Ministry portfolio. Has he been biting more than he can chew?

The clear answer is: Much too much. Let us take a clinical look at the facts.

Burdensome responsibility

Burdensome as Gonzi’s combined responsibility seems at first sight, his burden of office is decidedly very onerous.

His job is not simply to call Cabinet meetings and fix their agendas; he has ultimately to decide on issues where Cabinet or Cabinet committees are unable to agree. It is he who grants permission to ministers to miss Cabinet meetings or to leave the country. He is responsible (with the Leader of the House) for the government’s legislative programme and how government utilises its time in Parliament.

He is, of course, directly concerned with the organisation and staffing at the Office of the Prime Minister Office and the Cabinet Office. He has to make sure that Ministers can keep up with their workload, and supervises the creation, abolition and mergers of government departments and agencies. And he is also responsible for the overall efficiency of the government’ media strategy

Nor is this all. He also has to manage the relationship between the government and the presidency, and the overall relationship with the Opposition.

He wades, sometimes heavily, in the foreign policy sector, particularly in matters involving relationships with heads of government and in major issues involving national policy. Malta’s new relationship with the EU has opened up broad areas of involvement, some needing the Prime Minister’s imprimatur.

Close watch

When he wears the Finance Minister’s hat, he has to determine the framework of budget policy and keep a close watch, not only on the whole spectrum of government finance, but also on Malta’s economic performance.

As Prime Minister, Dr Gonzi works closely with the relative Ministers and, in many other cases, he acts after discussion and agreement in Cabinet.

It is clear that the burden, which each Prime Minister has to carry, is terribly heavy, and becomes more intimidating with every passing year.

Library shelves groan under the weight of published studies on the US presidency. Academic literature on the role of a Prime Minister, fitting the Westminster model, is thin. As far as I am aware, no such study has ever been published about the Office of the Prime Minister of Malta.

Strictly speaking, this topic is of a non-partisan nature and ought to be of direct personal interest to ‘senior’ politicians in the main political parties.

In a sense, the person who walks for the first time through the door of the Auberge de Castille, in the role of newly-elected Prime Minister, does not create or recreate the premiership: the job, to a considerable extent, already exists.

On the other hand, one cannot carbon date the emergence of the office. And the job changes, to some extent, with the incumbent.

Different styles

The Prime Minister may be a workaholic. He may have a penchant for delegating some, or a good part, of his chores. Others may consider that the most benumbing thing to the intellect is routine, and exercise their expertise in the currency of power. Some may perilously allow the tail to wag the dog.

Although Malta is a small, densely populated island, where politicians work under close public and private scrutiny, and where there is no available space for secrets to be kept for long duration, no one has analysed the style and comparative performance of successive local Prime Ministers.

Sir Paul Boffa, Dr George Borg Olivier, Dom Mintoff, Dr Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici, Dr Eddie Fenech Adami and Dr Alfred Sant were each as different from each other as chalk is from cheese.

Could one identify a single common thread that runs through their premierships, and which could be considered as an indigenous inheritance by their successors?

Keystone of the arch

True enough, the Prime Minister is the keystone of the Cabinet arch. Walpole’s historian, John Morley, was of the view that “although in Cabinet, all its members stand on an equal footing, speak with equal voices and, on the rare occasions when a vote may have to be taken, are counted on the fraternal principle of one man, one vote; yet the head of the Cabinet is primus inter pares and occupies a position which, so long as it lasts, is one of exceptional and peculiar authority”.

Indeed, the flexibility of the Cabinet system allows the Prime Minister, at any time, to take upon himself unlimited power, provided always that Parliament (or his majority) will stand by him.

There is perhaps a superficial way of looking at this subject. The Prime Minister is, technically and practically, chairman of the Cabinet, which, collectively, has its say. He wields the power of individual influence. Whatever that influence may be, it has to be exerted in many directions before the Prime Minister has his own say.

He has to deal with the Cabinet, with the President, with Parliament and public opinion – and all of these can be potent factors in given circumstances.

Heaviest burden

With the floating voter becoming more inquisitive, noseier and more demanding, the interaction of public opinion and the media are perhaps becoming the heaviest burden inhibiting Prime Ministers in modern democracies.

This is why Prime Ministers need a depth of field, in terms of experience, and elbow room to think and manoeuvre, in terms of the burdens they carry.

Lawrence Gonzi is by no means well placed in both departments – and some of his handicaps are of his own making

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