There is no doubt that Simon Busuttil has grown in stature over the past three years and today commands an argument with more strength than he did in his infant years as Leader of the Nationalist Party. It is also clear that he took the reins of his party and is steering it, as its sole captain, onto the destination he’s set his eyes on. Embracing Marlene Farrugia and convincing her party to run under the PN brand was no easy feat. He set out to send a message to all those who feel deceived by Joseph Muscat’s government but are still uneasy voting PN. The switch is logical; just follow the former PL Member of Parliament and possibly her partner and former PL Whip Godfrey Farrugia, is Busuttil’s narrative.
However, Simon Busuttil cannot afford to face the electorate with half-baked proposals or pies in the sky. He cannot falter in front of journalists who rightly demand to see the beef of any proposal dished out in the haste of the campaign.
A typical example is the populist (or maybe not so populist, considering that very few will benefit from it) proposal to give €10,000 to young couples who decide to settle in Gozo. Asked how this proposal will work, Dr Busuttil was lost in translation and didn’t provide a credible answer. Instead he told the journalists that his job is to roll out ideas and beef them up later.
Wrong, Mr Opposition Leader. This country has had enough white elephants and fancy presentations that lead to nowhere. If there was one thing which helped Konrad Mizzi gain credibility during the 2013 election campaign it was the level of detail he gave regarding the new power station. It is true that some major parts of that proposal where drastically changed once the PL took government such as its completion which took double the amount promised and the LNG tanker placed in Marsaxlokk bay which was not featured before the election. However, people had enough detail to decide whether Mizzi was confident on his proposal and this was what convinced them to believe him.
Dr Busuttil cannot be taken seriously that he can give €10,000 to young couples settling in Gozo because he doesn’t seem to know how to deliver his promise. He is also facing a bigger challenge because the traditional PN voter and most floating voters know that the PN has always been against hand-outs of any sort, so the sudden switch in ideology smells rotten from the onset.
Getting it wrong at the start of the campaign sets the tone and ushers in the suspicion amongst journalists on the campaign trail that proposals have not been properly weighed by the PN. Such a sentiment poses problems for the PN because people will tread with suspicion on other proposals such as those launched yesterday: free childcare extended to all families, free school transport to everyone and wider bands for children’s allowance.
Another problem Busuttil faces, now that he joined Muscat in dishing out campaign goodies, lies in the direction he took over the past four years by attack projects that are contributing to the economy. Busuttil failed to settle for an improved Investment Identity Programme (IIP) after he himself led a successful battle to narrow the conditions of sale of citizenship as initially proposed by Labour.
He also continued to hammer against the partial sale of Enemalta, which lifted a hefty financial burden off our shoulders, and he gives the impression that major private construction projects will be revised. Rightly so, the PN pointed out that the timely surplus announced by the Prime Minister was in part due to lack of capital investment in public infrastructural projects, but on the other hand the PN cannot deny that the spin-offs from the financial services industry it created when in Government are what they today call ‘the rent-bubble’ the ‘the inflated gaming sector’ and ‘the infamous IIP’.
A Labour government could have never embarked on such lucrative money generators had the past PN leaders not created the right environment such as EU accession and joining the Euro currency, both opposed by Joseph Muscat back when they happened. So it is legitimate to ask the Opposition Leader how he plans to fund his promises should he be elected PM on 4 June? Let us not forget that he also believes that electricity bills should be further reduced for industry if not for households as well. So what is Dr Busuttil’s stand on the IIP should he become PM? What is his current stand on high-rise buildings? Is ODZ going to be strictly ODZ once he is in power? All of these questions, and more, will impact the economy.
Dr Busuttil is definitely spot-on in saying that this is not an election based on proposals but on principles. If he believes himself, and we have no reason to doubt that, than he should steer away from throwing around fancy proposals that cannot be sustained unless the economic activity we’re so used to by now continues to grow. The PN cannot deny that such economic activity derives, albeit in part, from the projects the same party is still condemning.