Politics

Toroq fil-baħar

Il-fekruna għażlet il-Ġnejna biex tħalli erba’ bajdiet fir-ramel qabel lebbtet lejn il-baħar frisk u nadif ta’ l-ewwel jiem tas-sajf. Ma naħsibx li jeżistu fuljetti informattivi li jitqassmu fost il-fawna Mediterranja li jgħarrfu lil klijenti prospettivi dwar l-aħjar post fejn titfa’ bajdtek u tħalli ‘l uliedek jittantaw xortihom. Is-sinjura Fekruna ma tistax tistħajjilha f’xi kont ta’ Lewis Carroll tikkonsulta l-brochures splendidi tal-Malta Tourist Association iħeġġu l-koppji fkieren żgħar jiġu bi ħġarrhom jrabbu familja (jew mill-inqas iħalluha tfaqqas) ġewwa l-gżira ta’Pawlu.

Għażlet il-gżira ta’ Franco u ta’ Richard minn jedda il-fekruna. Forsi kien att ta’ disperazzjoni – kif iktar tispjega fatt li kien ilu ma’ jseħħ mis-sittinijiet? Il-fkieren kienu donnhom ddikkjaraw bojkott tal-gżira meta raw n-nies jindifnu fil-miżbla. “Le xbin tlaqna lejn l-Ellespontu u l-gżejjer tagħha hawn m’hawnx ħlief oqbra imbajda u qniepen.” Għadda ż-żmien u l-fekruna donnha tittanta xortiha. Ilna minn żmien Rio ’92 ma nduqu soppa tal-fkieren. Issa illegali. Għaldaqshekk kolloxsew. M’hemmx ċans li t-tfal tagħha jispiċċaw f’xi bouillabaisse post-modern f’xi ristorant mibni fuq il-foreshore kifsuppost.

Kienet taf forsi bil-programmi estensivi ta’ Joseph? Saret taf li ħadd ma hu se jitħalla joqgħod lura f’Malta progressiva? Kienux is-sireni progressivi li saħħruha bil-kant ta’ Tagħlim, Taħriġ u Xogħol? Ifhem, l-Ellespontu kien ilu ma jbandal hekk minn żmien Xerxes. Għadhom sa’ llum jiddu f-widnejn il-fkieren il-ħoss tal-frosta inkazzata u rrabbjata tfaqqa’ fuq wiċċ il-baħar. Illum hemm problemi oħra. Flus ma hemmx. Futur ikreh. Aħjar immorru Malta fejn minkejja kull sforz tal-iżolani li jitfgħu il-knaten fuq saqajhom l-affarijiet jidhru mexjin sew.

Imma żgur sinjura fekruna? Tifhimnix ħażin. Wara kollox ħaqqek grazzi talli għażilt gżiritna biex tiżra t-tama u l-ħajja. Imma din mhux gżira ta’ ward u żahar. Ilna nitfgħu knaten fuq saqajna. Fil-parlament mhux talli ma kibrux fjuri imma issa intlejna kakti u tingiż. Mhux dik l-agħar sinjura, l-agħar x’ħin tara l-kilba għall-poter u d-dominju tal-assurd. L-assurd iqarrabna wisq mad-dinja ta’ Carroll u Vargas Llosa. Ħarġu l-iskieken, sinnewhom sew u d-demm iċċarċar fuq l-artal ta’ l-ugwaljanza.

Għax f’din il-gżira sinjura fekruna l-ilsna tal-bejjiegħa tal-ħolm jidilkuk bil-għasel tal-wegħda ta’ prosperita. Jgħannu l-għanja tal-ħelsien mill-jasar immaġinarju li għaġġnu f’moħħom biex bħal speċi jiġġustifikaw il-qagħda tagħom. Imma mill-kliem għall-fatti hemm baħar jaqsam. U x’baħar dak. Il-progress f’dan il-pajjiż ma jfissirx li tqiegħed lil kullħadd f’kundizzjoni li jtejjeb ruħu. Ma jfissirx meritokrazija. Il-progress għandu l-minġel f’idejħ u jekk int tajjeb iżżejjed, jekk b’ħilitek inqtajt mill-folla issibu jistennik – u b’daqqa waħda jaqtagħlek saqajk. Hekk… issa ġejt daqs ħaddieħor. U hekk kullħadd l-istess. Kullħadd kuntent. Progress achieved.

“Prosperity or egalitarianism — you have to choose. I favor freedom — you never achieve real equality anyway: you simply sacrifice prosperity for an illusion.” – Mario Vargas Llosa

Żgur sinjura fekruna li se tħalli ‘l uliedek hawn fostna? Iva ħallejna gwardjan magħhom lejl u nhar biex żgur ix-xorti xxaqleb favurihom. Bil-bouncer 24/7 fuq ramlet artna. Imma barra minn fuqhom li jikbru u jitgħallmu u jsiru intelliġenti. Barra minn fuqhom li b’ħilithom isibu xogħol imħallas tajjeb. Għax hemm isibuħ il-progress jistenna bil-minġel ileqq f’idu. Minġel ikreh li jixxejjer bid-dagħdiha tal-għira u l-inkapaċita tal-injurant. Jekk hemm bżonn nipprostitwixxu parlament sabiex nitkażaw jekk taqlax iktar mill-President . Hemm aħna sinjura fekruna… imbasta ħadnilek ħsiebhom sakemm nibtu… imma jżabbu jmorru aħjar minna.

Wara kollox x’iriduhom dal-flejjes kollha? Bil-flus tagħmel biss toroq fil-baħar, u x’iżżobb se nagħmlu bihom dat-toroq eh?

Aqdef ja bagħla aqdef.

 

I.M. Jack – Sunday’s Legal

The law has become a dominant part of the news over the past year or so and not only because of the supposed reforms that are being carried out (thanks to/in spite of/to comfort/with or without) Franco Debono. Ubi societas, ibi ius or so the latins teach us – wherever there is society there is the law. A legal system is at the core and backbone of our society and it allows us to survive each other and our naked ambition and instinct. Respect for the law and its principles are probably much more crucial for the survival (and creation and promotion) of a just society than economic prosperity. We are witnessing however a complete dilution and dumbing down of our legal framework.

What we have is a combination of a full frontal assault and denigration of all things legal. We have seen columnists who assume that their appreciation of the law with all its underpinnings and implications is superior to that of any legal practitioner. We have witnessed  lawyer politicians who opt to prostitute their profession in favour of political mileage. We have seen the gradual erosion of public confidence on the law and the legal system based on urban appreciation of legal events, shoddy and sensational law reporting and opportunist political mileage. The law faculty continues to gaze at its toes as its graduates increasingly seem to be unable to engage in logic and analysis due to serious shortcomings in the linguistic department.

The judicial branch is still under fire from many quarters and is still reeling from the reputation-killer events of recent memory. The Chamber of Advocates seems to be more intent on either playing second fiddle to political interests or in getting a piece of the power cake by pushing for more control over warranted lawyers – a push that smells of control of competition as much as anything else in this country of fishpondism.

Court Detectors: The Gozo law courts now have new detectors following the appalling stabbing attack that involved among others my childhood friend Kevin Mompalao. It is ridiculous that this kind of event has to happen before the obvious – such as the installation of a metal detector is put into place. Having said that, once the detectors WERE put into place it is rather useless to complain that they were formerly used at the courts in Malta as though this makes them bad metal detectors. It seems they were only removed since they could not cope with the flow of persons at the courts in Malta. Unless I am mistaken the courts in Gozo do not exactly deal with the same number of “clients” daily. Also, much of the agitation by the lawyers in Gozo stank of political manipulation. Justyne Caruana would do better to call for better ethical screening of some lawyers who practice regularly in Gozo and run on the Labour ticket. Who knows maybe she should start asking questions how a lawyer ends up owning property that used to belong to clients he “represented” or for example how he might decide to ignore the legal institute of curatorship. They are legitimate questions – based on the respect of the law that we are all trumpeting about. Go ahead Justyne… start that kind of campaign and I’ll back you on that one.

Reforms: I was asked to take a look at the Draft Administrative Code that is presently before out committee for legal reform in Parliament chaired by the Hon. Franco Debono. This Draft symbolises all that is wrong with the current wave of ambitious reforms. This is not the forum to even begin to discuss what is wrong with the “code”. The weakness of the legal drafting is only the tip of the iceberg. The administrative code nibbles away at crucial principles of our legal system while purporting to replace them. Are we really contemplating this kind of shoddy legislation simply because one MP decided to make much noise? While we can understand how the man in the street can be appeased with talk about efficient legislation right after a bitching session about the state of the courts, length of court cases and cost of lawyers bills surely the legal minds of this nation have not been flummoxed into submission to accept anything that has been thrown into the playground of toys for ambitious reformists?

That Constitutional: I followed with interest the tennis match between Giovanni Bonello and Giuseppe Mifsud Bonnici with regards to the issue of declarations of unconstitutionality by the courts of Malta. In a very small nutshell this is what they were saying: Judge Bonello implies that whenever a court decides that applying a law to the facts before it would be unconstitutional then that law should automatically be null and void. He adds that such a law should not require a parliamentary intervention for it to be rendered void thenceforth – the law would become null and void erga omnes. Judge Mifsud Bonnici on the other hand has argued that the nullity is only with regards to the facts before the court and that the law is not automatically rendered void. For what it matters J’accuse is in full agreement with the GMB version – particularly because the wording of our constitution is quite clear using the terms “to the extent of the inconsistency”.

Having said that what is truly worrying is that this kind of debate is played out on a newspaper. We do not have any serious fora for non-partisan discussion on legal developments. It is definitely a shortcoming of the faculty of laws. It is also the result of the lack of continuing education among us lawyers who prefer to concentrate on the more profitable sides of the profession. A direct consequence of this is that the biggest “academic” interests in the laws are usually intrinsically linked to professional interests. Drafting of laws – even special (especially special) laws – will inevitably end up in the hands of those lawyers who have a direct interest in the outcome. Do not confuse specialist with direct interest. The reason that the rules relating to parliamentary representation, interpretation of parliamentary procedure and the issues of separation of powers have taken on a downward spiral is because the “lawyers” busy dabbling with these laws are those who have a direct interest in the results: polticians.

Discussing this kind of legal issues and reforms on the Times and Xarabank is not exactly encouraging for the future. Kudos, by the way, to Chief Justice Silvio Camilleri for his clear unconditional explanation to the Times as to why he will not abet their efforts at sensationalising the courts and their work by replying to their queries.

 

That’s all for legal sunday.

Measuring the hypothetical

There is one area where Muscat’s Labour will definitely not go wrong  and that is recycling. Unfortunately the kind of recycling that we are talking about is less of the environmental kind and more of the Nikita Alamango pass-the-financial-times kind. The latest idea to be grafted off the international progressive menu is that of A Fair Society – a most noble and brill idea when in the right hands.

Take, for example, Andrew Sciberras’ blog post that lists what his idea of a Fair Society should entail (A Fair Society). It’s the kind of list that we could very easily back (bar my misgivings about taxing anybody’s well-earned income heavily – I’m not one who gets excited about taxing success to pay for failure). Yes, Andrew’s list merits much more than a fleeting discussion and the main reason is because it includes definite positions and proposals that you may agree with or agree to disagree with (and hopefully propose alternatives).

Not for Joseph’s progessives though to take a concrete position on any of the proposals – whether Andrew’s or let’s say Franco’s. Even less is it for Joseph’s progressives to come up with positions of their own that they could suggest as their bag of values for voters to decide upon. What we HAVE heard till now in terms of concrete proposals are the two general ideas about further education for plus sixteens and the package of suggestions for disabled persons and their entourage.

In both cases Joseph’s progressives have come up with suggestions that cannot really be translated into actual legal measures. At most you can call them “encouragements” that are similar to “tax breaks” in the commercial world. You cannot coerce parents of a disabled person to set up a trust fund. You can suggest it to them and create the mechanism. I will leave it to the better informed and specialised to comment on the pros and cons of a policy that claims to promote independent living for the disabled without actually being able to do much about it.

The same argument goes for the 16 pluses who opt out of the educational system. Mark Anthony Sammut has done a good job of deconstructing Joseph Muscat’s ideas about young people being in studying, training or employment (Joseph Muscat’s Job Guarantee). Much of what Muscat was “proposing” in this field already exists in the form of further education and training opportunities. Once again the “policy” idea turns out to be tanto fumo niente arrosto (as they say in the noble language of philosophy, politics and L’espresso magazine).

Which  brings me to the furore of the grand new scheme underlying “The Fair Society”. Joseph Muscat and his progressives have discovered “social impact assessments”. Here is how the Times reported it:

The Labour Party will be committing itself to undertake a social impact assessment every time a major economic policy is to be introduced, Labour leader Joseph Muscat said this evening. Closing a policy seminar on social justice organised by the Labour Party with the theme A Fair Society, Dr Muscat said the assessment would be held to provide an overview of how the proposal would affect various sectors of society, especially vulnerable people.

Wow. Impressive. Now where have I heard that one before? Let me introduce you to a new friend: Mr. Regulatory Impact Analysis. I’ll ask Mr Wikipedia to introduce him better:

The role of an RIA is to provide a detailed and systematic appraisal of the potential impacts of a new regulation in order to assess whether the regulation is likely to achieve the desired objectives. The need for RIA arises from the fact that regulation commonly has numerous impacts and that these are often difficult to foresee without detailed study and consultation with affected parties. Economic approaches to the issue of regulation also emphasize the high risk that regulatory costs may exceed benefits. From this perspective, the central purpose of RIA is to ensure that regulation will be welfare-enhancing from the societal viewpoint – that is, that benefits will exceed costs. RIA is generally conducted in a comparative context, with different means of achieving the objective sought being analysed and the results compared.

Here’s another thing. RIA’s have been used in the European Union for the past decade having been introduced by the Commission in 2002. In 2005 and 2006 as you can read in the linked Wikipedia article – “the Commission updated its approach to include economic, social and environmental dimensions, thus moving in the direction of Sustainability Impact Assessment.” (See for more detail: Craig Robertson’s EIPA paper on RIA in Europe). The inter-institutional agreement strengthening impact assessment across the main institutions (including Parliament) was signed in 2006. Well, well… looks like somebody learnt a thing or two out of his stint sitting in the parliament of the European Union. Yep that same European Union that he advised everybody to vote against.

Now here’s the final point. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the introduction of a national system of impact assessments – whatever you choose to call them (social, regulatory, sustainability). It’s actually recommendable. It’s a lovely field of law and I know that a former colleague of mine at the Court of Justice – now a Jean Monnet Chair at HEC University in Paris – is specialised in the field. The thing about impact assessments is that they have to have policies and legal programmes to assess.

You see, Joseph Muscat was telling us that he has got nothing yet insofar as policy is concerned but WHEN HE DOES EVENTUALLY HAVE SOMETHING (and hopefully he will) he will measure it for its impact on society. He will see whether it is fair. We sincerely hope that the idea of a Social Impact Assessment will not be dropped but rather promoted. On the other hand this is no reason to bring out the trumpets and fanfares and finally announce that Labour has a policy to speak of.

Labour has simply told us that it has a new ruler/measure. And whether it opts to measure in inches or centimetres, the measure of its ruler would currently point to zero insofar as concrete policies and proposals are concerned.

The politics of serenity

I don’t know whether Carm Mifsud Bonnici has his own facebook account – though I know that he does blog on a regular basis. If he does have a facebook account – or if he did – it would be fitting if his current status read “serene”. He told reporters that felt serene both before and after the vote of confidence and this because he was prepared for every eventuality. Kudos to Carm Mifsud Bonnici who has opted to put on a brave display of cool, calm and a very Christian (democrat) form of zen. It is no coincidence that the emotional and physical behaviour of Mifsud Bonnici provide a stark contrast to the picture of a power hungry, angry and revengeful Franco Debono.

Joseph Muscat may have stressed the fact that this government (read the parliamentary group) remains divided and that no amount of confidence motions survived with the speaker’s vote or that of a recalcitrant Debono will improve the situation but the leader of the progressive movement may be missing the wood for the trees. The lack of political acumen in Labour is ever so glaringly obvious when they persist in error. The very rift that caused glee among labourite supporters and among those nationalists who are dying to spite GonziPN by seeing the end of it is the very foundation upon which the nationalist party’s potential revival is built upon.

How I hear you ask? Well to begin with the issue of the CMB motion was an eye opener of itself. Politics as it should be was nowhere to be seen. You may get the sweeping statements about the “unjust justice system” and you may have an opposition spokesman turning a list of grievances about the courts, the police and the laws into a show of unhappiness. What we did have in actual terms however was a bloodthirsty attack at the throat of an ex-Minister – for by the time the motion was presented (and amended into a call for resignation) that was what CMB had become.

If the subject of the motion had been the supposedly disastrous state of affairs in the justice ministry then the only resignation that should have been demanded – and a symbolic one at that – should have been of the Minister currently in charge of the portfolio. That would be Minister Chris Said. So many lessons of ministerial responsibility, collective responsibility, governmental responsibility had been given in press conferences and long-winded speeches that one would have expected this motion to be directed at the right person. But no.

And it is evident why not. Because politics and responsibility had nothing to do with this motion. Whether or not you agree with the ills that befell our justice and security systems in the past few years, your cause, your petita was not considered one bit. Instead – as has been widely documented – this was a vendetta. It was personal.

J’accuse has elsewhere complained about the use of certain terminology in politics. The martyr complex, the excessive descriptions of “suffering” and “hurt”. A large part of our voting masses reason in these terms. It is no crude calculation on the basis of policies but rather a complex build up of emotions where a partisan DNA struggles with feeling of entitlement, chips on the shoulder and some weird collective illusion that politicians suffer whenever they “serve” the people.

Carm Mifsud Bonnici’s serene acceptance of the inevitable outcome of the vendetta plot is no cup of hemlock. It is a rallying call. Strategically the moment of serenity is a necessary stroke of genius. Given that the political battle on a national level seems to have taken the direction of being fought out on the emotional rather than the factual fields then might as well take the cue early in this pre-election run. Mifsud Bonnici’s serenity comes out stronger when contrasted to the actions of his self-appointed nemesis Debono and that of the braying power-or-nothing pitchfork gang on the benches of the opposition.

We would have thought that exposing the absolute vacuum that is Labour’s sum total of projects and preparedness for its time in government would have been enough for PN to have a field day. On second thoughts and having seen the latest events unfold we cannot but applaud the emotional counter-moves that have begun to surface. If anything it will distract attention from the embarassing gaffes being committed in the social marketing field – better known as the mychoice.pn campaign.

Malta Post-Franco (Reprise)

Discussing the Franco Debono situation over lunch yesterday, we joked that his statement of “I will not vote with Labour” (as reported by MaltaToday) meant just that. Admittedly our considerations were more in jest than anything else but we considered the possibility that Franco was using his very literal form of reasoning in the sense that “not voting with Labour” does not necessarily mean voting otherwise.

I must admit that given the information earlier that morning I too was surprised by the outcome of the final vote. Surprised to a certain extent though. While I had not seen Franco’s vote coming I was fully aware of the consequences of this vote in the sense that there would be no great collapsing of government, no tumbling down of the temples of power and that the only “victim” of this latest fit would be Carm Mifsud Bonnici.

Incidentally we had also joked that since the motion of confidence had concerned a portfolio that was no longer in CMB’s remit then technically there was nothing to resign from once the vote passed. I know, it’s no laughing matter but the way things were going laughter did seem to be the best medicine. The whole body politic has been in the thrall of Franco Debono’s voting antics for quite some time now. As we pointed out in an earlier series of posts (Malta Post Franco I-IV), Franco is doomed to be a temporal blip in political history.

Sure a record might be broken here and there – such as the forcing of a resignation of a minister (within living memory) but the long-term impact of Franco on the Maltese political landscape was always intrinsically linked with the one-seat majority that the nationalist party enjoys (ah, the cruelty of language) in parliament. The content of Franco’s agenda (or whatever screen he has put up to disguise any personal ambitions and compensation for suffering) is all watered down when seen from a long-term perspective.

In two matters Franco has been unintentionally and unwittingly useful. Firstly his protracted theatricals have served to exposed one major weakness of our representative democracy. The obsession with guaranteeing a bi-partisan approach and discarding all other models (such as one that encourages proportional representation) has meant for some time now that the JPO’s and Debonos of this world expose the stark reality of “election or bust” oriented parties without a backbone. This is a weakness that no “premio maggioranza” would solve , rather, it would only serve to entrench the two parties further in their twisted machinations.

The second useful matter concerns the Labour party. Franco’s bluff and no bluff has actually uncovered the Labour party’s brash “power or nothing” approach that discards any conventional value-driven approach while grafting the ugliest versions of the nationalist party to what it believes to be its own benefit. Valueless politics giving way to full blown marketing was already bad enough. Now we have Labour with it’s catastrophic approach. Muscat’s Labour has shot itself in the foot so many times it probably lacks any limbs.

There is a third, important conclusion that one should add. It is the ugly reflection about the “general public”. A large swathe of it – or the particularly active part of it – have proven to be ridiculously hopeful of the promises that Franco seems to have bandied about. His pet subjects were manna to the ears of the disgruntled – particularly conspiracy theories peppered with mantras about arrogance, cliques and friends of friends. His tales of hurt and suffering – culminating in the infamously comic “broken chair in Court” episode could only strike home if the audience were (how can I put it) less informed.

To conclude, the merry go round that risks being extended once Franco misses out on the latest redistribution of power has exposed huge fault lines in our appreciation of how a basic democracy should function. Separation of powers,  judicial authority, parliamentary privileges, public security and rights were all melded together in one big bouillabaisse of political convenience.

Franco’s minutes in the political playing field are now counted. We should have moved on from gazing at Franco months ago, yet we (and the press have much to blame for this) are still at the mercy of his idea of a guessing game. The real politics that will affect out lives for the coming five to ten years lie far away from Franco’s hand. Sadly, nobody seems to be bothered to find out what what those politics and policies really are or will be.

…

from Malta Post-Franco (II)

To get at Austin Gatt, Joe Saliba, Carm Mifsud Bonnici, Richard Cachia Caruana and others Franco Debono decided that the best option was to threaten to topple government. He had had enough waiting in the sidelines for his opinions and ideas to be heard and for a place in the decision making clique that counts. So he refused to play.

PM.pn – auctioning off the prime minister

I’m afraid that I may be a little late on this one since I was still lounging by the pool when this “initiative” made the headlines. To be quite honest when I first heard of it I thought it was a joke – a funny “tickle me under the arms” affair that goes by the name of satire these days. Could it be that the lads at Bis-Serjetà pulled off another “The Onion” inspired headline?  Sadly my first hunch was wrong and the Partit Nazzjonalista was really offering its followers a chance to “become PM for a day” (and win an iPad 3 to boot).  Here is how the Independent reported the possible winnings (PN launches “Be PM for a day”):

The winner of this contest will be handed the opportunity to propose one particular idea or project, as well as naming his or her own members of Cabinet and members of parliament from their acquaintances. The winner will spend a whole day with the Prime Minister on Tuesday, 19 June during which he or she will get to meet the press, tour the corridors of Castille, and discuss policy ideas with Dr Gonzi.

Now this idea of “reaching out” to the public by one of our two political parties smacks of “wrong” in so many ways that I risk missing out on some of them if I do not turn them into a “list”. In these days when marketing and snazzy websites might trump content many people might think that this move is actually “good”, we beg to differ and here is why:

1. PN (a party) – PM (a head of government)

The first and most obvious objection to this crass exercise of X Factor meets Castille is the fact that a party initiative, kicking off from a party website is auctioning off the role of a government position. Not just any government position but THE BIG KAHUNA. It’s the PM seat for chrissakes and they are not even playing make believe. For it would be one thing if the winner would “fake” being Prime Minister and play along in a sort of re-enactment with his friends and the press… you know a sort of King Carnival but for politics. But it’s another thing when our Prime Minister is actually part and parcel of the prize. Which brings me to point two…

2. Does not PM Gonzi have better things to do?

After all what with all these ridiculous motions by the opposition, an economy to hold steady and a government with that perilous one seat majority you would expect a Prime Minister to spend his time in better ways than prancing around with a make believe duplicate addressing press releases about fancy projects from the citizen. What does he expect them to come up with? Something fantastical? A tunnel to Gozo perhaps?

3. The Miseducation of Joe Citizen

Once we’re on this play acting business, even if we were prepared to play along with the party game then there is the not too irrelevant business of education. If we really are trying to get something out of this exercise how about not drumming home the idea that the PM is such a powerful man that he names “his or her own members of Cabinet and members of parliament from their acquaintances”. I mean for crying out loud do they not even stop and read what they propose? A PM choosing members of parliament? From their acquaintances? What shall we call it? “Il-parlament tal-ħbieb (tal=ħbieb) tal-Prim Ministru”? A prime minister does not choose members of parliament – the people do. That’s lesson number one in basic democratic skills innit?

4. Tour the corridors of Castille and discuss policy

Seriously. I was under the impression that Castille had its open days during the nuits blanches that are thrown every now and then. Anybody could get to walk into Castille and shake Dr Gonzi’s hand. As for policy – this is running a bit thin isn’t it? I mean is this the best “listening” the PN can do?

The “Be a PM for a day” is an exercise that would be more fitting in Azerbaijan than in Malta. Yet it is happening and the danger is that it is actually being taken seriously by the fourth estate and the voters who are meant to be more demanding on our politicians and their parties. What next? Shall we bring Simon Cowell in to evaluate the contestants? After all guys like Christian Peregin might have a conflict of interest selecting the winner while also interviewing them on the day they got to play PM.

Strength and resilience. Lord knows that we’re going to need much of those till election time.