By all accounts the Nationalist Party appears to be on the brink of an upheaval, the kind that could cost political careers and potentially redefine the national political order of the day.
Disgruntled MPs within the Nationalist parliamentary group are baying for blood and calling for the head of Minister Austin Gatt, blaming him for a series of pre-electoral political misdeeds - having been responsible for the water and electricity hikes and the ongoing reform of the public transport service, both of which, it is being contended, cost the PN dearly in the second bitterly lost MEP election campaign.
Yes, it was a European parliamentary election that had little to do with either of Dr Gatt's initiatives, but the overwhelming 55:40 per cent Labour-Nationalist vote spread represents far more than that, despite the fact that the parties' distribution of seats at the European Parliament has remained exactly the same - at least until the Lisbon Treaty sees the light of day, if it does so at all.
And that was exactly the campaign Labour's leader, in his first electoral trial, fought. It was a very clever game the PL played in diverting national attention away from the European parliamentary issues, the focus on which would have left the field pretty much open for either party, and convincing large sections of the electorate that the MEP election was to serve as a judgement on, and a message to, the party in government.
It was clever in that the ruling party is always unpopular in mid-term elections, even more so a little over a year since the general election, and it was clever because the decisions that have been taken in the last year have proved so unpopular.
Perhaps the government could have resorted to the kind of electoral gimmicks it was reluctant to use this time around for fear of them having been labelled as such. After all, rent reform and Mepa reform are just around the corner and there is little doubt that the pencil pushing could have had its tempo increased so as to have had both reforms ready in time for the election. Then again, the content of those reforms could, at the end of the day, have proved dangerous in electoral terms.
That there is anger within the PN camp over the MEP result is evident and understandable, but recent moves from disgruntled MPs could unwind the party beyond the point of no return for the next general election.
It is surprising that the PL has not yet sought the political mileage afforded by calling for an early election. It could be awaiting the results of yesterday's counting of the local council ballots, or it could be biding its time and waiting for its opposition to unravel by itself.
It is unclear whether the PN will buckle to the demands being made of it by a faction of its MPs, a faction that is up in arms over last weekend's polling result, but possibly also perturbed over the way government posts were redistributed after the last election. Austin Gatt did, it must be noted, emerge from the reshuffle with the Cabinet's heaviest portfolio.
The delivery of Austin Gatt's head on a silver platter, after all, would prove the opposition's arguments over the utility rates issue as having been valid - something the PN is not likely to concede at any cost.
But while at the time of writing concrete results of yesterday local council election counting were still very much up in the air, what appeared to be a swing toward the PN in at least two councils, although the PL came out on top in terms of the percentage of votes cast, could help to take the sting out of last Sunday's result.
Deplorable and commendable
The way a young man was robbed of his life last week on the streets of Paceville is utterly deplorable. But, on the other hand, the harsh condemnation of the brutal act from large swathes of civil society has, so far, been commendable.
The fact that the young man in question was a 28-year-old Sudanese migrant with humanitarian protection status residing at the Marsa Open Centre factors into the equation, but that is secondary to such a tragic and unnecessary loss of a young life.
Sadly, whether the sequence of events, which is being determined within the courts of law, was an act of random violence or racist violence, does not alter the fact that a human being who had undoubtedly been through multiple hardships between Sudan and Malta will now never have the chance to live the better life he had sought for himself in Europe.
That other races are forcibly denied entry to several of Malta's bars and clubs is a fact, and the practice has been common since well before the migratory phenomenon began in earnest five to six years ago. Arabs, for example, are regularly denied access to Malta's clubs and the consequences of protesting against bouncers' decisions are often violent but seldom reported.
The fact that the extreme far right, people who have in the past advocated such violence, and worse, made greater political headway in the MEP elections is a cause for concern - not for fear that they could by any stretch of even the most fertile of imaginations derail the political status quo, but simply because their numbers are growing, and so are the accompanying sentiments.