It’s been weeks, if not months, that the Nationalist Party hyped up a concocted story that Prime Minister Robert Abela was about to call an early election.

The PN media was getting all excited about it, with stories appearing every week, if not every day, that Abela was preparing to make the call for an election to be held before the end of the year.

Dates were given, two in particular, 13 and 27 November as, according to the PN media, Abela had no other option than to set polling day because of the crisis – the PN media’s word, not ours – the country was facing.

Last Monday, Abela burst the PN’s early election bubble.

The election will not be held this year, he said. It will be held in 2022, the year when it is due.

“I have always said that the election will be held when it is in the national interest to do so. I do not think that it is in the national interest for an election to be held this year, and therefore it will take place in the year it is scheduled for, 2022,” Abela said.

His declaration killed the speculation which was mounting, largely thanks to the PN, and which was creating an uncertainty that the country did not need, especially since the economy always suffers when an election is approaching and, in particular, during the campaign.

What the PN did not realise – or perhaps its strategy was intentional as part of the political game – was that it was speaking about instability caused by conjectures about the election date, when it was the PN which was behind all the hysteria.

Now the PN has to sit back and wait, at least till January. Last Monday, the sound of the PN’s electoral balloon deflating in Pieta’ could be heard all over Malta.

Five, not four

Let’s put things into perspective.

The Labour Party has already lost one year in government. Joseph Muscat had cut the legislature down from five to four years when, in 2017, he had called an early election.

The circumstances were then very different from what they are today. The Panama Papers and all that came with them had stirred too much trouble for Muscat and his friends, and an early election was required to start afresh. At the time, it was believed that the PN, with its emphasis on the fight against corruption, was eating into the 35,000 advantage Labour had built in 2013.

That the PL ended up winning in 2017 with a slightly bigger margin must have surprised even the most hardened Labour supporters. But that’s how it went. The PL was considered to be by the majority of the electorate a better alternative to the coalition led by Simon Busuttil, Marlene Farrugia and friends.

If Abela had called an election now, this second consecutive Labour legislature would have been shortened by between six to nine months, too many for the diehards. They would not have liked to “lose” more time in power, even though they know they’re going to win again. But the way they think is like this – the PN spent 25 years in power (except for 22 months under Alfred Sant) – and if Labour is going to give up one year per legislature it will have to take more elections, and therefore more risks, to reach and surpass that target.

Robert Abela

Abela toyed with the PN in the last few weeks.

Until last Monday, he was playing along and did not directly address all that was going on about the election date. He went as far as missing his Sunday public appearance twice in a row, adding fuel to the already raging fire that something was in the wind. Some media houses went as far as sending their people to Girgenti last Sunday when it was rumoured that Abela was meeting ministers one by one.

Maybe Abela stretched it a bit too far, and should have ended all speculation long before last Monday, given that it was spiralling out of control and starting to have an effect on the economy.

But it’s part of the political game that he is, of course, entitled to. He must have been amused seeing the PN organising three press conferences every day and very much in a campaign without there being one. He must have thought to leave them running out of breath, and possibly even funds. He must have enjoyed the guessing game and how the PN seemed to have been obsessed with having an election in November. After all, it was the PN which was creating all the fuss and, from Labour’s point of view, it was the PN’s fault that the wild, baseless speculation was growing.

And he waited until the last available day to destroy the PN’s fantasy of an early election. There has to be a minimum of 33 days between the dissolution of Parliament and election day and, guess what, there are 33 days between 25 October (last Monday) and 27 November, the date that the PN and its media had on its calendar – and in their heads – as the election day.

Given that Abela had said, more than once, that an election will be held when it’s in the country’s best interest to do so should have been a strong hint. It’s true that Prime Ministers think of their party’s chances when deciding on a date, and Abela will pick one when it’s more convenient for Labour. But what happened in these last 18 months must also have a bearing on the PM’s choice.

An election in the run-up towards Christmas would not have been in the best interests of the country, especially one with an economy that is still on the way to recover from the negative impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The business community would not have been happy with an election date just before Christmas. They would like to see people eating in their restaurants and buying gifts from their shops, possibly to partly make up for what was lost since March 2020.

It would have been wrong to have an election that could have possibly disrupted business again, and any level-headed person could understand that. The last thing that the Maltese economy needed now is another period of uncertainty.

The PN

That the PN was advocating an early election which inevitably creates instability is, to say the least, incomprehensible.

The cynics will argue that, by wanting an early election, the PN was trying to cut its losses, get it out of the way and start a new chapter with a new leader. That would be the fourth time in less than a decade (Simon Busuttil 2013, Adrian Delia 2017, Bernard Grech 2020).

It does not look like the PN will get anywhere near Labour, for the third time running. Surveys continue to show a huge gap between the two parties and in the trust ratings on the two leaders. So, from the outside, it would be better for the PN to have an election as late as possible.

Maybe some crucial information will come out during one of the many court important cases that are dealing with the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia and other hearings on money laundering accusations.

Maybe the police will finally gather enough evidence to arraign more people involved in the scandalous situations that have emerged in the last years.

Maybe there will be a deeper negative effect on Malta’s grey-listing by the Financial Action Task Force, which came about as a result of all the mishaps under the previous head of government, Joseph Muscat.

Maybe Konrad Mizzi will finally find the courage to testify before the Public Accounts Committee on the Electrogas deal, and hopefully be more forthcoming in his answers than he was in the Caruana Galizia public inquiry. His silence, if he chooses so, may prove advantageous for the PN too.

Maybe we will get to know more about the deal the government reached for the transfer of three public hospitals to the private sector.

It is unlikely that any of the above or more will change the outcome of the election. But it would probably help reduce the gap.

As it is now, aside from the corruption issues which, let’s face it, did not have much of an impact in the 2017 election, it seems all smooth for Labour.

Over the past weeks – as a result of the hype it chose to create – the PN has been in election mode. It was gearing up with multiple daily activities and press conferences, thinking of them as a launching pad for the real campaign. There were times when it was clear that the PN was inventing subjects just to have reporters going over to the Dar Centrali every day.

Now they have to regroup and re-think their strategy.