The result of the European Parliament elections of last weekend needs to be analysed beyond its statistical value of percentages and numbers. It needs to be analysed well in order to understand why people decided to vote the way they did, or refrained from doing so. The message behind the discrepancy in the number of votes obtained by the major parties, though worse than hoped for yet better than expected for the PN, should be useful information in mapping out the political programme for the coming years.

This result in fact needs to be analysed within a wide-ranging context of circumstances that can shed light on what led to it. One major factor that characterised the government’s endeavours in the last year was the global financial crisis. The reality through which our country passed and is still going through, together with the rest of the world, has been described as the worst economic and monetary downturn of the past 100 years. This reality has forced itself onto the agenda of priorities of the government, threatening employment among others. All this at the expense of projects which had already been set and targeted to take place in the very near future, taking second priority.

The party going for an election from the opposition benches has the advantage of commenting and criticising the government’s track record, while keeping an arm’s length from the situation. In fact, it shied away from offering solutions. The government’s responsibility dictates otherwise. While ailments need to be highlighted in order to be faced, one doesn’t appreciate the flaunting and exaggeration of such ailments, without suggesting one single solution, as the MLP did. The responsibility that binds the government makes it far more difficult to be popular with the electorate; there is even the possibility that some will even get to dislike the government for taking certain steps. However it is every serious government’s responsibility to take decisions that will benefit the common good in the long run.

This government gives all due importance to the European Parliament elections because they are truly important. This party in government is the same party that campaigned wholeheartedly to give Malta its deserved place within one of the world’s strongest economic and political blocks of the world. However this government also has the onus of shielding us from the onslaught of the financial meltdown around us while maintaining Malta’s competitive edge. The challenges ahead are great, and the political map ahead needs to be designed within this context, and not to safeguard popular acclaim.

This result needs to be taken seriously because it may mean that certain decisions could have been taken in a better way, or that the method used could have been a little unsavoury. The result can also mean that the government did not manage to get its thoughts behind the decisions through to the people, or in the ideal way. This could have led to certain decisions seeming isolated from the motives behind them. The responsibility for any successful communication always lies with the sender of the message and hence the government needs to shoulder responsibility and improve the process to communicate better with the public.

I am optimistic that the Nationalist Party will once again read the signs of the times and understand what the people are saying even on this occasion. Reflection on this result is paramount, and so the government needs to invest the remaining four years of office to improve its operation and the way it is communicated. Above all, this government needs to show and convince one and all what is in effect a central tenet of its work, that it cares about you.

Dr Jason Azzopardi is

parliamentary secretary in the Finance Ministry