Finance Minister Tonio Fenech likened the present state of the economy to a car with two punctured tyres. He however insists that the car is still able to move forward albeit at a very slow pace. The minister was speaking figuratively, stressing that the economy was showing signs of stability even if the situation remained fragile.

The minister chose his words meticulously. The current situation is so disquieting that in his mindset the country has more than one puncture. It has indeed two. Now in normal circumstances a driver would do well to stop his car at the first service station where he could replace his faulty tyre. Otherwise he should stop his car there and then and have his punctured tyre removed and replaced before the roads start gnawing into the rim.

Now if the minister insists in driving the economy forward with two punctured tyres then both rims and ourselves are in quite a quandary, to put it mildly. Because even if good sense had to prevail and instead of driving the car for longer stretches of road, causing further damage to it, the minister stops to make necessary repairs and replacements, he has only one spare tyre at his disposal.

Which means in essence that when the minister speaks of two punctures then what he is really saying is that the car is not in a position to move forward at all, unless he is first towed to the next service station where he could have both punctured tyres repaired or replaced! Which goes a long way to describe the real state of the economy in the words of the minister responsible for it.

He reiterated his forecast that 2009 could see the economy shrinking by nearly 1 per cent, which was not good, but much better than most EU countries, he says. Now, this is the minister who in his long and winding budget speech last November, his very first, had projected for the country economic growth at a galloping pace of 2.5 per cent for this year, notwithstanding the fact the international recession was already making landfall by then. He, or his advisors, had made this forecast on the partisan premise that the “economy is resilient” to the international crisis and so he thought that he could drive the Maltese car through bumpy terrain, littered with insidious crater-size potholes, with little or no damage at all.

You see our nationalist ministers have this irritating habit, the electorate is now getting familiar with, of seeing big. Instead of drawing up a stimulus package to cushion the economy from the effects of the international recession, the minister, or rather his Prime Minister, thought it fit to saddle the economy with a steep hike in utility rates right in the middle of a crisis that is hitting hard larger, mightier and more productive economies abroad and at a time when international oil prices hit an all-time low.

So while Barack Obama immediately took his limousine for a rebore as soon as he hit negative growth, Lawrence Gonzi decided to drive his mini-minor into hostile terrain at full gas. So while Barack Obama is seeing the first signs of economic recovery Lawrence Gonzi has ended up with two, not just one, punctures.

No wonder economic guru Gordon Cordina, whose advice is revered by nationalist ministers, and rightly so, was uncharacteristically gloomy in his appreciation of the economy – particularly when it comes to its recovery. He says that although the financial crisis did not affect Malta as badly as it did in other countries in the short term, Malta might be in a worse situation when the other countries are recovering in the medium term. This was because many companies had retained their workers since skilled employees were hard to come by in Malta, preferring to lose profit instead. So when it came to medium term recovery, while other companies abroad would have money to invest and be more competitive, the Maltese would find it hard to remain so.

What Mr Cordina did not say, or was not reported, is that with the utility tariffs businesses’ profits have continued to plummet and have starved investment as funds have been siphoned off to the energy corporation – the mother of all inefficiencies.

What the economy now needs is to tow our punctured nationalist government to the next general election for a proper rebore and replacement.

Dr Gulia is the Opposition’s main spokesperson on the economy and the self-employed