So much ink and myriad electronic signals have been wasted over the past few days following the revelation that Marisa Micallef, the erstwhile PN-inclined columnist and ex-chairperson of the Housing Authority, has joined Joseph Muscat’s national movement for change, that one understandably at first hesitates as to whether to throw his/her money’s worth or not into the issue.
But change, not for change’s sake alone, and the courage of one’s convictions have always intrigued me. As a raw “Marxist” teenager I remember feeling disgusted when Paul Johnson, former editor of the New Statesman and great left-wing columnist, suddenly decided to switch ideological sides and become a true-blue almost overnight. How could he do that, I kept asking myself rather naively, fully aware that I did not, and still do not, believe in on-the-road-to-Damascus styles of conversion.
Change, however, in time hits each and every one of us. Many of my ideological standpoints over the years fell like the walls of Jericho, which, if you give credence to Biblical accounts, had less of a human touch to their demise than those of Berlin many, many centuries later. My political predictions fared even worse. I have been predicting a Labour electoral victory since 1998, but then I have also long been vainly forecasting a Champions League spot for my favourite UK football side, West Ham.
It is not always a negative trend, mind you. In 1987 I thought Labour would be massacred at the polls, instead it lost by a meagre margin after almost 17 long years in power. People then did not think of the term “the power of incumbency” as some form of excuse. Even better, in 1996 I would in no way be convinced Labour stood a remote chance with an untested new leader against a still strong Fenech Adami. It won handsomely. It may not surprise my readers to learn I never buy any Super 5 tickets, even with half a million euros beckoning.
Contrary to general perception, “crossovers” in Maltese politics are not new, not even rare. They have happened rather casually at times, but at other times they have also occurred against a background of animosity and lamentation. Whatever the circumstances and nature of these interchanges, they involved people from all echelons of the parties concerned.
Soon after being elected with a mere one-seat majority in 1971, the Labour Party had one of its Gozitan MPs tempted with an opulent bribe to switch sides.
That he didn’t was, of course, to his credit and proof of great personal integrity. Later during that same legislature, Alfred Baldacchino, then a Nationalist MP, crossed the floor of the House to join Labour in what was to be a twist of fate for both him and the party in government. But he did so out of conviction, suffice to say the then Mintoff leadership had first made sure the move was a voluntary and genuinely convinced one.
After the electoral debacle of 1998, the drift from Labour became almost embarrassing. We all had friends and acquaintances who simply started to think in PN terms. The whole scenario was compounded by the EU membership issue, which actually resulted in a Kama Sutra of counter juxtapositions.
Halt. Stop recording. Enter Joseph Muscat in 2008. The lad promised an earthquake of change and the ground has been shaking ever since, sometimes at ultra-low decibel levels, other times with a deafening roar. Immediately after his election as party leader, I wrote in this very same column that “constant change is here to stay” and I dare say I am being proved right. It was not a prediction, thank goodness, but a belief.
As with all others, past and present, Marisa Micallef has every right to rethink and to realign. If we can accept this within a religious context, why can we not do the same in politics? I bet there are, at present, several government MPs who would happily give a limb to have that same courage of conviction, just as there must be those within the Labour fold who feel threatened by it all. New ideas hurt some minds the same as new shoes hurt some feet.
It is easy to conclude that Joseph Muscat does not believe he is trying to build an army of turncoats, which is why he is rightly talking about a national movement. There comes a time in every nation’s existence when only a multi-task, multi-colour movement can save it from auto destruction. That we are a nation on the brink financially, economically, spiritually and even politically is no secret and Labour should be justifiably proud it is streamlining this whole process of change in the way we think, act and hope.
One way to have a clean mind is to change it now and then. It is also a fact of life that most people are willing to change, not because they see the light, but because they feel the heat. Whatever the reason or motivation, a change of direction remains the biggest priority for Malta and the Maltese, though it needs to be said that this is neither to wiggle out of any freely chosen national commitments nor to revert to methods that would merely be sad throwbacks to different times and different goals.
Having shifted the drift away from Labour towards Labour, Joseph Muscat is seemingly aware that the task in hand is no joyride. There will be the opportunists and the hangers-on, the resistance movement and the army for change, the empire seekers and the defenders of empires... all of them put together in one formidable bandwagon that ironically feeds on this whole, all-engulfing turmoil.
As the great instigator, he now has to mount this powerful monster and guide it to its predefined destiny. Before it is too late.
There is no looking back for him as the movement continues to gain momentum and the caravan of hope finally establishes the new base on which to really and truly shove these islands into the 21st century.