With a public discussion being held by the Nationalist Party’s women section this evening at St Paul’s Bay, political activity is back after the summer recess.
Even if Parliament will reconvene only next month, political activity re-starts as from today. And one may wager that the Labour Party will follow suit even if the PN uses these days as a prelude to its Independence Day celebrations.
This summer, contrary to previous years, the two parties kept going even if in a minor key, Sunday after Sunday, with usually short phone interviews by the leaders on the party radios.
And of course, there was no lack of political controversy – from Panama Papers to economic growth, from medical visas to key failings or perceived as such by top PN persons.
Slowly, inexorably, we are moving towards the next general election, now less than two years ahead. The political tempo is rising, the controversies get keener and the parties prepare themselves for the coming battle.
Meanwhile, we will have the EU Presidency to deal with, the very first time Malta will have this honour and task.
Three and a half years into Labour’s first term under Joseph Muscat, the electorate will be called to judge the consistency of Muscat’s government. The parties have meanwhile been holding polls but no results have been made public so far. According to those polls that were being made before summer, support for Labour has declined but support for Dr Muscat is still strong. PN however has eaten into the unusual PL majority in the 2013 election.
It has been said, even by Dr Muscat himself, that cases such as the Panama Papers have detracted from public attention as to the results of the present government. These cases have not been buried and forgotten by the electorate. On the contrary, they hang as an albatross around Dr Muscat’s neck. And far from being buried in the public subconscious, they are still there with all their pernicious influence.
The EU Presidency, then, will focus continent-wide attention on Malta, and our faults and defects will be magnified while our merits may well go unnoticed. Such is the way of things.
As tempers rise, and as the election once again becomes a keenly fought battle, it is always worthwhile to urge political discussion to observe certain standards.
Archbishop Scicluna himself, preaching at St Julian’s last Sunday, appealed to blogs as to where they can go and where they should not go. There are already heated discussions in the blogs, comment spaces, et al, as to who was the archbishop referring to rather than to see how true is his argument and how one and all ought to hear his responsible voice and plea.
Ours is a passionate country where politics are the national pastime. Unless the leaders lead by personal example, we may once again come together in a clash that may make us the talk of the continent.
Above all and beyond all there is (or is not) personal commitment of righteous action and behavior, against anything that might smack of corruption or of turning political office to a search for riches.
The past three and a half years have not been full of glowing examples of this.