A sense that something big, momentous, and maybe potentially dangerous, is in the air. Shops half-closed, announcing they will be closed on Monday, people wary of joking on the streets or establishing eye-contact with passers-by, or staying indoors. And, starting today at midday, ears cocked to hear the first car streaming past with horn blaring and to see which flag hangs from its window.

Welcome to Malta on Election Day.

After which, in a move that puts to shame the French people when De Gaulle entered Paris or the Italians when the Americans marched in, the other well-established national trait – “transformism”. Regardless of polls that show one half voted one way and the other half the other way, it will be the whole population and then some that throngs to Valletta to acclaim the leader.

At least the polling booths are curtained off this time so that the assistant electoral commissioners sitting in the room cannot scrutinize which part of the ballot paper you write on. But that is the only change so far. Even on a cold day such as yesterday we still take the elderly, the bedridden, the people in hospital, to vote as if everything depended on every last vote. And we all find we are on one list or another; we get phone calls telling us to go and vote and our names ticked when we enter the polling booth.

We may have joined the EU and we may have changed over to the euro but our national politics is still mainly tribal, Tutsi and Hutu. We even had one politician say the other side has a different DNA. Every five years we have this eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation where nothing is sacred, where it looks like it is down to every last vote.

This past election campaign was one of the most vicious in living memory – and this is very surprising, considering it is just a normal general election, rather than entering or not entering the EU, considering we are supposed to be maturing politically, considering we have a better educational background, and so on. If we go back to past elections, we cannot recollect an election in which the leaders of the two main parties called each other a liar.

Whatever improvements we are supposed to have made to our national culture, we still seem to be in a winner takes all mode when a general election comes round. There is nowhere for the loser to go, it seems.

What those outside the grip of government, such as those in the private sector, fail to realise is the huge number of people that depend on whoever is in government for their jobs, houses, social benefits, perks, promotions, contracts... The extent of patronage enjoyed by the party in government is simply unimaginable.

Hence, people running around on the eve of an election to find out who is offering the most. Hence the very distasteful handing out of all the above-mentioned sweeteners and, even more than that, right up to the last minute, which can be construed as dirty and corrupt practices.

The truth is there is far more of this kind of people around than one thinks and that is one sure pointer of the direction the election could take. The Nationalist Party has been in office since 1987, less two years, and has not done much to change this situation. On the contrary, it has adapted to it and tried to ride it to its own benefit. And a population brought up on this kind of milk soon learns to tramp from door to door to see who could offer most. The only real solution would have been to have weaned the population so that it can stand on its own two feet, but that’s easier said than done.

The last week of the election campaign was enlivened, if that’s the correct word, by two serious episodes.

The first related to what at first looked like an allegation from the Labour camp that Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando owned a field in beautiful Mistra valley he was going to turn into a disco.

Then came what must have been PN’s worst blunder in the whole campaign – to allow and abet Jeffrey’s urge to directly confront Alfred Sant and contest the allegations. This culminated in the fracas at PBS before what was to be Dr Sant’s press conference.

But then more and more details were leaked by Labour which called into question Dr Pullicino Orlando’s earlier denials (even though he complicated matters for himself as well) until the whole issue deeply shocked those who really care about preserving what remains of Malta’s countryside. He should have been disciplined by the PN, or even ruled out of the electoral contest, if that could be done.

The incredible ovation given to Dr Pullicino Orlando on the Granaries on Thursday may have sounded as approval of someone who stood up to Dr Sant but it also shocked those who stayed at home (and were thus the mythological undecideds) who were astounded these people were applauding the ongoing rape of our valleys.

It should also have been significant that no notice was taken of what Dr Pullicino Orlando brought up to counter Labour’s claims on Saturday – his claim of the filing or otherwise of accounts by Charles Mangion’s and Karmenu Vella’s company.

The other issue of course regarded the Alternattiva leader Harry Vassallo and VAT returns. Having a leader of a small party being threatened with jail two days before a crucial election is something straight out of Ceaucescu, or, to quote Alfred Sant, Belarus.

Much has been said that it must have been a purely police mix-up but can anyone be so sure? How did the NET journalist come to know about it and why did he confront Dr Vassallo about the issue three hours before the police turned up? The question to ask here is, as usual: Cui prodet? Who does this benefit? Of course, this has enraged core AD supporters, who would have voted AD anyway, but it could also have scared those who were wavering, under the relentless pressure the PN was making. In fact, on most blogs the reaction was not so pro-Harry as one would have thought: many people argued he should have seen to this issue in due time, that the VAT people are not so unreasoning, that he should not have paraded his family, and so on.

Still this was a first, a bad first, a very very bad first.

Here we are then, on this morning when the results are still not out but the die is cast. May the winner be merciful, the loser not so upset and may we all grow in political maturity. We owe this, at least, to our country.