Our capacity to be duped is immense, so is the ability of the spin makers to focus public anger at some likely culprit. We have had (or still have) the big Arriva disaster. Launched with much fanfare last Saturday, and with typical Austin Gatt fiery language (he forgot that the government is no longer in charge of public transport, so he officially had no reason to ask for the sacking of the workers who did not turn up), the much-touted new bus system has become a huge public relations catastrophe for a beleaguered government which needed that like it needs a hole in its head.

The drivers who did not turn up certainly affected Arriva’s carefully planned timetable with incredible knock-on effects both on Sunday and even more on Monday, but there is more to it than that.

The collapse of the public transport system has uncovered a serious lack of preparation and has been exacerbated by many policy decisions that affected the entire system.

After all, this was a huge change for Malta after so many years of seeing the system in the hands of primitive owners who skimped on investment, who milked the system and who turned the passenger (the client) into a slave, far from being king.

So it should have been very clear right from Day One that such a change would encounter huge reactions on the part of the bus drivers/owners, even after they pocketed the huge sweetener the government chose to give them.

Without trying to excuse or take the side of those irresponsible drivers who did not turn up (and yes, Arriva was right to sack them on the spot), we must ask why no one foresaw that if you recruit, let’s say, 100 of these owner-drivers, you are asking for trouble.

Why was the system that was launched on Sunday thrown into so much disarray by the defection of some 60 of the drivers, when we had been told Arriva now had some 500 drivers? These questions lead us further into the crux of the issue.

Normally, business launches have a soft opening. This is true of a restaurant, a hotel and any other business venture. Why and who decided to go for a Big Bang, rather than a soft opening? Maybe there are clear and valid reasons, but we and the entire country, would like to hear them. We would also like to hear, while we’re at it, who took the decision.

Let’s examine a little bit more of this Big Bang approach.

Apart from the Big Bang inauguration of the new service on Day One, we also had a Big Bang in that new routes were launched, and a totally new system was inaugurated.

Prudence would surely have argued in favour of retaining the old, Valletta-centric system which the public was used to and only introducing the new interchange system gradually, slowly, and with full explanations to people.

New routes have been introduced and many of the new routes are not to commuters’ liking. People fail to see why their bus has to tour round four or five villages when it did not do so in the past. Yes, we are talking of the Valletta-centric system which is now obsolete, but did anyone factor in the delays that have been now introduced? Likewise, people had become used to the mixed system which added buses to the university and to Mater Dei on top of the Valletta-centric system. Maybe it was not neat from a planning point of view, but it worked and people had got used to it. Now that’s all been changed and people were not prepared for the new interchange system, nor are they prepared for the long time it is taking them to get anywhere.

This also touches on the communications strategy adopted which, it is clear now, was very lacking. Last Sunday, the people were not informed at all. Just sending one multi-coloured map that looks like the London Underground map to households is not adequate communication with the Maltese population. Most of the people who had to use an interchange were mainly left to fend for themselves.

The Big Bang approach also dictated the decision to switch Park & Ride at Floriana to a paying car park as from Day One. This meant that on Monday, people who did not trust the new system drove to Valletta instead of using the bus. Since the Park & Ride system is no longer free, they milled around trying to find a place to park. Result: More cars on the road, less room for the Arriva buses to manoeuvre. More delays, more people getting hot as they wilted behind Arriva buses in the narrow streets.

There’s much more to say, but we’ve run out of space. One last question: Why was the contractor who won the award for the kiosks allowed to string out the delivery of the kiosks till October? This paper was the only one that had foreseen that commuters faced a summer in the sun as a result. No one seemed to have taken the initiative to hire some temporary shelter, until now. It’s nothing short of a miracle that the elderly have not dropped like flies in the sun and in the heat.