There is rarely a dull moment with Marlene Farrugia. The renegade MP who broke ranks with the Labour Party and became an independent Member of Parliament last November yesterday soft-launched her fledgling political party – a move that had been long anticipated and expected.
Whether this new party, dubbed Partit Demokratiku, will be a mere flash in the pan or whether it will have the staying power to last through to the next election, and to actually be elected, remains to be seen.
Whatever the case, Dr Farrugia has struck while the iron is hot. She has also quite effectively championed two causes that have captured the national attention over the current legislature: environmental protection and the fight against corruption – two areas in which the government has been perceived to be failing miserably.
Political sentiment towards both political parties, truth be told, is currently questionable and there are plenty of floating votes to be had, particularly from those who supported the Labour Party at the last general election but who have since become embittered by its leadership’s lack of action in the wake of the Panama Papers revelations.
Moreover, her championship of the environment – from the Zonqor Point controversy to her more recent calls for a moratorium on large scale developments – also strikes a resounding national chord. In fact, it was during the Zonqor Outside Development Zone land giveaway furore that Dr Farrugia first broke ranks with the party, to wild applause from the country’s ever-growing and increasingly-important environmentalist lobby.
It was perhaps inevitable that push would finally come to shove and Dr Farrugia would choose to part ways with the party on whose ticket she was elected to Parliament.
The writing was quite clearly on the wall since she took that first decisive step when she joined the Opposition’s protest against the massive sell-off of Outside Development Zone land at Zonqor Point. Since at least then, Dr Farrugia has been a relentless thorn in the government’s side – taking stance after stance against her party’s line and in favour of the environment.
She was a voice for the environment in the metaphorical wilderness of the government’s benches. She spoke out fearlessly against what she and so many others have clearly identified as the wholesale of Malta’s natural environment.
That day, it now transpires, was probably the real point of no return: either she would make her own political party see sense and the very clear error of its ways, or the MP and the party would have to part ways.
And Dr Farrugia’s actions in resigning from the Labour Party and going independent showed that she has both the moral compass as well as the gumption to do what is right irrespective of the cost. Yesterday she went a step further and founded her own party.
While it is, most likely, that she will draw her largest support from that environmental lobby, her stances against corruption have also struck a national chord.
Dr Farrugia’s concerted stance against corruption materialised when she addressed the Opposition’s second rally against corruption in the wake of the Panamagate scandal, and when she presented a private members motion against the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Keith Schembri.
This scandal has also struck a national chord, and quite strongly at that, and her unrelenting stance in this respect is also bound to earn her points among the electorate.
It will be a strange situation in Parliament with a technically independent MP heading a new political party that promises to be a force to be reckoned with. It will, in fact, be as close as the country has ever come to having a third party represented in Parliament, as far as recent political history goes.
With her strong and vociferous stances in favour of the environment and against corruption, Dr Farrugia is clearly very much in sync with the national sentiment. These are also two areas in which the current government is perceived to be failing miserably. Whether this will at the end of the day, or legislature, propel her and her new political party to electoral fortune remains to be seen.
Whatever the case, it is definitely a party for Dr Farrugia, but dealing with Dr Farrugia as a rival political force will surely be no party for the country’s current political duopoly. With this new political development, one thing is certain: interesting times certainly lie ahead.