The ongoing big race between the US and China for who is going to become the world superpower shall continue for a number of years. Quite soon, China’s efforts picked up momentum and are still doing so. Publicly already in the US, under both the Trump and Biden administrations, the American authorities have acknowledged the issue as the most important geo-strategic challenge their country will be facing.

In this context, what should be the EU’s position? Practically nobody in Europe believes it has any chance of entering the race to then pip the other two contestants at the post.

So should the EU stay neutral? If not, whose side should it be on? Many, including academics of repute, assume that for historcal reasons and also because the two parties (or so they claim) share the same values, Europe should back the US. Others insist that in terms of realpolitik, Europe has to take into account the deep links that tie it to China, which has now become its leading commercial partner.

The question still needs to be decided. Still unclear are the criteria that the EU will fall upon to arrive at a decision... if there is going to be one...  

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CONFERENCE OF THE SPEAKERS

The decision of the four ex-Speakers of the Maltese Parliament under PN governments is hardly believable: they boycotted a symposium which they were invited to address, that current Speaker Anġlu Farrugia intended to organize. It would have been a discussion about parliamentary proceedings. The reason they gave was that with the crisis which the country is experiencing, now is not the time for a discussion on the lines proposed.

There is no other way by which to understand this move except in terms of partisan manoeuvering. For indeed, if what the ex-Speakers said about a national crisis should be taken at face value, then now is more than an appropriate time for a mature discussion about Parliament... and say, how or whether that institution has served and is serving as an effective democratic tool to ensure accountability and transparency in public affairs.

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MALTESE LANGUAGE SOCIETY (UNIVERSITY)

I was under the impression that the Maltese Language Society (University) –known as l-Għaqda tal-Malti (Università) – had given up the ghost long ago and was extinct. I was mistaken. A news item informed us that its managing committee made up of youthful members, has just been approved for the next two years. During its decades-long history, the Society frequently served to crystallize national interest in the Maltese language, projected as one that is suited for day to day concerns as well as a literary vehicle. Some of its past student leaders eventually became outstanding exponents of literary expression here.

Without any doubt, faced with the profound developments that internet and computer technologies are generating in the ways by which we communicate, the Maltese language needs to have backers with an intrinsic commitment to it, so as to help it ride through the digital wave not sink under it.

If young people do not back that goal, the effort to achieve it would soon collapse. Let me wish full success in their endeavours to the members of the new committee of the Society.