The Good Governance proposals released by the Nationalist Party have the two-fold objective of higher standards for future nationalist governments and halting the steady regression of the present Labour government. As aptly put by The Malta Independent on Sunday’s editorial on the day of the launch: the document “truly attempts and succeeds in many ways to put the ‘good’ into good governance”.

Labour’s first institutionally corrupt republic

Obtaining something as simple as fixed-line telephone service in the 1970s and 80s was part of a system of political patronage dishing out favours for votes. Buying a colour television without a recommendation from the Minister required an additional underhand payment to the public official. Corruption was normal practice across the board – from issuing building permits to buying a bar of chocolate.

Twenty five years of Nationalist Party governments proved to be the decisive break from a state system marred with the institutional corruption of Malta’s socialist era. Economic and political liberalisation and institutional building did the job. The Ombudsman, the Permanent Commission against Corruption and the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee, together with other newly established institutions, provided for good governance and for its continuous improvement. Of course, this continuous improvement was part and parcel of the upping of standards, reacting to novel situations and exposing flaws within the system.

Towards another Labour-led institutionally corrupt state

Paradoxically, the more effective and successful the institutions created by successive Nationalist administrations, the more tainted the same administrations were made to seem. Higher standards even made lesser sins look graver than the previous obscenities. Joseph Muscat, then in Opposition, milked the situation to the full. Good governance, transparency, accountability and zero-tolerance to corruption soon became New Labour’s battle cry and the strategy reaped results.

Less than three years down the road and the situation has been turned on its head. The new Labour government has not only grossly failed to improve the already-set standards but it is steadily piloting their progressive decline. There is barely one Ministry that has not been tarnished with accusations of corruption and lack of good governance. Instead of meritocracy we have gone back to a system of ‘jobs for the boys’. Instead of accountability, we get convicted criminals appointed to lucrative public jobs. Instead of transparency, we get a public broadcaster and a Department of Information that conceal government mishaps and censor Opposition criticism. And the list goes on.

The negative response of shooting the messenger

Two Sundays ago, the Nationalist Party launched a set of proposals for good governance: a document that tackled 10 problems by providing solutions based on 10 principles. Restoring trust in politics and political institutions unfortunately returned to the fore of the political agenda as soon as a Labour government was installed back to power. And, once again, the challenge seems to have fallen in the lap of the Nationalist Party.

Arguing that the PN in Opposition is proposing what it should have proposed during its 25 years in power is only partially true but more so utterly unfair. As already argued above, 25 years of Nationalist administrations were one continuous progression of institutional building, sometimes at a fast pace and sometimes a slower pace, which eroded institutionalised corruption, if not individual corruption. It is only in the last two years of Labour government that we have seen progression turn into regression. If the Gonzi administration could be accused of anything, it would be of sometimes being over-zealous when it came to taking action, as was the case with the mayor who ended up in court for letting his daughter use his publicly-funded lap-top computer for Facebook. This was happening at the same time that Labour was continuously welcoming to its fold defectors from the Nationalist Party who it had itself previously accused of corruption.

Simon Busuttil is proposing to raise the bar. Attacking his credibility instead of discussing his message will simply get us nowhere. It will only serve to reinforce the status quo of corrupt practices and a lack trust in the country’s institutions.