Your correspondent J. Bonello from Naxxar, who is no acquaintance of mine, deemed it appropriate to state that the Leader of the Opposition, Dr Joseph Muscat, is my hero! I wasn’t aware of this myself till he informed me (TMIS, 16 September, pg 23).
I can assure your readers that this is not the case at all, as I admire and have but one hero. He is very unique and goes by the name of Jesus-Christ-with-no-Frills. Muscat also doesn’t feature in my Top-Ten admirable personalities who are of the calibre of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Angelo Roncalli, Pierre Teilard de Chardin and the like.
Though, for very good reasons, I have had strong Socialist beliefs since my early youth, I adhere to no party. I find Socialist principles make for a far more equitable society than the local brand of the somewhat hypocritical ‘Christian Democrats’, which smell of fascist overtones, strong suspicions of behind the scenes dealings, favours a sort of capitalism with notions of arch-conservatism. Remarkably contrary to this, the Socialist camp actively favours a dynamic society where everyone, irrespective of race, creed, economic position or sexual orientation, will be in an effective situation of equality and participation, where no basis of discrimination will remain and where self-management will exist in all fields.
Furthermore, in an effort to preserve my identity, and have the satisfaction to freely call a spade a spade, when the need arises, I belong to no club or association of any kind. Thus between black and white, I can distinguish several shades of grey! This stance has served me well, and in all likelihood, I shall keep it up till late into my dotage!!
What I can tell readers is that I stand foursquare behind every word I wrote in my earlier contribution entitled “WiserChoice.PL” (TMIS, 9 September). Evidently, your correspondent Bonello drafted his emotional barrage in a rage and possibly when suffering from a bout of insanity. Also, he might have hoped to draw me into some endless polemic. In order to learn a thing or two, even about fine writing, I respectfully suggest he follows, from time to time, my further contributions to this paper and other sources.
Today, the basic argument at stake lies heavily on the reliability or otherwise of the statistics quoted by the present administration. It seems almost certain that these have been seriously tampered with, as they do not tally with the reality down here on the ground. Moreover, I do not exclude the possibility that the adherents of this regime have been totally taken in by such half-truths, which goes to explain their resultant cock-eyed vision, one such dream being that most farmers and workers would be all too happy to give them their vote as things are running like clock-work for them, when indeed I can assure your readers that it isn’t at all the case and the majority by far will favour Muscat’s Partit Laburista, as they have done since time immemorial. Very irritated people from all walks of life today reinforce these traditional Labour supporters. The people now have had enough of GonziPN rhetoric and excuses; the people are exasperated.
Bonello maintains that ‘his’ (?) party will manage to collect most of those yet undecided voters. As the matter still has to be put to the test, this is pure conjecture on his part. On the other hand, I am convinced and consequently insist that WiserChoice.PL is the only viable option available to any bold, progressive citizen. My hopes are high that Dr Joseph Muscat will effectively send the lot packing before Christmas, hence also doing away with this GonziPN pontificating from the moral high ground.
Ramon Borg-Bartolo
SLIEMA