The drums roll and the tumbrils are already out. It’s four weeks (already) since the election and the knives are out for the defeated leader.
So far, par for the course. Lawrence Gonzi and after him Simon Busuttil resigned as soon as the results came in. Adrian Delia was ousted in a palace coup without contesting a general election. But Bernard Grech has already made it clear he does not intend to resign and on the contrary he will campaign to be re-elected.
And to prove this and throw down the gauntlet he announced this week a thorough reshuffle of the Shadow Cabinet, removing the three who had been in Gonzi’s Cabinet pre-2013.
Maybe he should have been more circumspect and showed his hand only after his eventual re-election. That would no doubt have been portrayed as weakness and indecisiveness but you can’t win, most times.
The knives are out, make no mistake about it. Bernard Grech has transgressed and must be brought to heel. At this point the outcome of the eventual leadership race is uncertain. It is in Grech’s own interest to force the issue and test the consistency of his own support.
What I am certain about is that what has been called the establishment of the party, that section which has been calling the shots all through these years, has now declared Grech as unfit for the post.
The attack has been multi-pronged.
One stream condemned the side-lining of the former ministers, conveniently carried in the paper linked to one of the three. These three have been around for many years and are valid persons. But the electorate would have seen them as symbols of the discredited Gonzi team or would have been made to see them thus.
Another stream can be divided into two: those who focused on the inclusion of people open to the decriminalisation of abortion and those open to a more lenient approach to hunting.
On these two issues the party still has to have a proper open discussion and one not on the eve of an election. Bernard Grech’s attempt to force the issue was rightly condemned as premature and jumping the gun.
What many seem to be forgetting is the damage that blood-letting of this kind could do to the party as a whole such as happened in the past legislature. The party ended up like a piece of meat fought over by a pack of dogs.
The main duty of the party leader is to lead but just after this comes the duty to mediate between the various strains of the party, between the anti-hunting group and those who are in favour (at the party grass roots level they are many), and between the majority anti-abortion believers and those who, like most young people in Malta, are open to the pro-abortion arguments or at least to the decriminalisation arguments.
The good thing that has happened to the party has been the new breed that has made it to Parliament (also thanks to the gender positive discrimination mechanism). They have breathed new life in a party which up to mid-March looked locked into the ‘Gloriosa Patria' rhetoric or the Daphne hard core. It would be criminal to disregard this opportunity.
Yes, a mechanism must be set up to harness the experience of the former ministers (if they want to still help, that is). Yes, youthful inexperience has allowed some damaging soundbites to be made. Yes, the party leadership should have handled this exercise better.
There are now some up-and-coming new Members who can give valid advice to the leadership. But only as long as the party does not get hijacked or panicked into the same tired rhetoric that cost the party so much blood-letting in the recent past.
And in any case, just look at the other side, for Pete’s sake!
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