There is no other word for it: propaganda using public funds, repeated over and over for weeks on end: billboards, inserts in newspapers, adverts on TV and radio. One set of these is for the latest pie-in-the-sky project: the 20 projects, please note, with no timelines and costings whatsoever, for the harbour area. The other set of adverts is trumpeting the “great leap forward” purportedly brought about by the 2008 budget.
The waste of public funds on propaganda is scandalous, on a par with the scandalous use of public broadcasting in the eighties, which the PN likes to remind us of from time to time. It reminds me of Stalinist and Maoist propaganda: singing the praises of the current set of “great leaders” in power. The waste of money is scandalous simply because these are not “public information” notices telling people how to make use of a particular government service, which department to contact for details about a particular scheme or other; it is just pure propaganda at the taxpayers’ expense. “A computer for your child” and “You will now be given more children’s allowance”: party slogans from a partisan government. It is the “Chavezisation” of our own Gonzi and Gatt. “Mintoffian” propaganda at its very best, unashamedly forced on us by an arrogant, condescending Nationalist government.
The same government that is promising us no less than 20 projects in the harbour area is the same one which misspent millions on a passenger ferry terminal at Cirkewwa and Mgarr, Gozo, which are not even complete yet, years after the supposed deadline. It is the same government that overspent on tens of projects. This is the same government that sold public land to hoteliers for tourism projects when the country was still developing this sector, and allowed them to turn them into pure speculation projects. This government always favours speculators. One wonders why.
Lawrence Gonzi’s government is just a continuation of the Fenech Adami administrations: talk about Malta’s “Europeaness” without a real commitment to long-term, visionary reform in public administration. People are treated like gullible children, asked to contribute towards drawing up the budget without any indication of the expenditure and asked to phone Kastilja a few days before the budget speech. Anyone with enough grey matter cannot help seeing through these ridiculous gimmicks. The MLP is not promising anything particularly different. They are afraid to face difficult issues and grab the bull by the horns.
The only way to get out of the rut is to enhance democracy. Pluralism works. The most democratic and successful European countries are where they are because they value real debate on issues. They really make democracy work. Malta can get there too. The choice is yours: whether to let them dupe you into thinking that there is no alternative to the current status quo or whether to vote for plurality, modernity and real change. Not a change of faces, a change from blue to red, but a change in mentality and a change in the way things are done. Force them to discuss; stop the bulldozer “Mintoffian” way of doing politics once and for all.
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Ralph Cassar is AD councillor in Attard and the party’s Deputy General Secretary.