Of U-turns and challenges

My friend Desmond Zammit Marmarà (September 25) has a misguided idea of democracy. Once he agrees with the present policy of Labour's "new leadership", namely, that of accepting Malta's membership of the EU "at all costs" on a permanent basis, he cannot then claim that the party "has democratic credentials", since the MLP would be accepting that instead of power being in the hands of the elected representatives of the Maltese people it is transferred to unelected foreign bureaucrats in Brussels - on whom the Maltese people have no control through the ballot-box. If in doubt, I suggest to Mr Zammit Marmarà to consult speeches made by the MLP leadership before April 12!

When a political party loses an election but attends parliament and sits on the opposition benches, that party de facto would be "respecting" the will of the majority. No political party worth its salt changes its fundamental political credo and embraces that of its political adversary just because it loses an election. What serious political parties do - if they are convinced that they were right in what they were saying during the election campaign - is to continue to show that they were right. Of course, the party may have to change and devise new ways of communicating with the electorate.

But to throw overboard your own convictions does not add credibility to the party. It will only give the impression that it is greed for power which is dictating party policy. I do not see anything "democratic" in that. Does Mr Zammit Marmarà think that had the Nationalist Party lost the election - as they did in 1996 - they would have embraced "partnership" and dumped "EU membership"?

The present Labour leadership is not saying it is ready to give the Maltese people a chance in the future to say "no", even if membership turns out to be an albatross round Malta's neck. This is certainly not the way how "all Labourites" can unite to present "one front towards a well-deserved victory", as Mr Zammit Marmarà suggests.