KMB warns of possible split in Labour Party

Former Labour Party leader Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici warned yesterday that there would be a split within the party if the faction clamouring for the renegotiation of Malta's accession treaty with the European Union was not given the opportunity to express its views within the party.

Speaking in a one-on-one debate on the Radio Malta programme Mhux kelma bejn tnejn, Dr Mifsud Bonnici said: "The (Labour) Party has to understand that either it gives space to the minority or that minority will lose its faith in the party and will leave the party.

"That minority will leave the party if it feels it no longer has the chance to get its views accepted."

Presented by Fr Joe Borg and Dr George Abela (former MLP deputy leader for party affairs), the programme focused on the motion that Dr Mifsud Bonnici will present to the delegates at the party's general conference next month. Current Labour leader Alfred Sant was the other guest on the programme.

Dr Sant, the party's executive and the parliamentary group are directly opposed to Dr Mifsud Bonnici's motion, arguing that the MLP general conference had made it clear in 2001 that the EU issue should be decided in the general election, and that had now happened.

The outburst by Dr Mifsud Bonnici about the split in the party came about when he was reacting to a question asking him what he would do if his motion was defeated.

Sticking firmly to his guns, he said he would do his utmost to persuade the delegates and, if he failed a second time, he would try again and again until those in a minority became a majority.

Dr Abela had pointed out that Dr Mifsud Bonnici's ongoing insistence on his motion would lead to an internal haemorrhage in the party. Dr Mifsud Bonnici quipped that a split within the party ranks would follow.

When, likewise, Dr Sant was asked what he would do if the motion was accepted, he said he would rather not answer hypothetical questions.

Dr Mifsud Bonnici is proposing that the Labour Opposition do its utmost to get the EU to renegotiate the membership treaty with Malta.

While he is an MLP delegate for life, Dr Mifsud Bonnici also heads the Campaign for National Independence, which wants Malta out of the EU and also forms part of Front Maltin Inqumu, led by the grand old man of Maltese politics and former Labour leader Dom Mintoff, who wants to see the EU treaty with Malta renegotiated.

Dr Sant argued that it was not a question of changing the treaty but a matter of being prepared to shore up the workers against the disadvantages inherent in EU membership.

Dr Mifsud Bonnici also argued that it was not fair that the outgoing party executive council should accept or reject his motion and the party's document on EU membership, for that matter.

The document deals with the new circumstance obtaining in the country once the electorate had voted for EU membership. At one point, Dr Sant admitted that the stand the MLP was taking now about EU membership was not being fully understood by party supporters.

The outgoing executive, which may or may not be re-elected, should not bind the incoming executive, Dr Mifsud Bonnici maintained.

Dr Sant said it would finally be the general conference that would bind the new executive.

Dr Sant added that the party document had been discussed in district meetings and assemblies, and now the delegates wanted a clear policy so that the party would henceforth see how the tough problems facing the country could be tackled, with priority being given to the interest of the workers and their families.

It was at this point that Dr Mifsud Bonnici claimed that he had been barred from talking to the party unconditionally to explain his motion.

He said that the party had allowed him only to talk to delegates in small groups without the presence of the public and without the presence of the media.

He complained that, whereas the party made full use of its propaganda machine to push its views, he had to struggle to get his views across.

Continuing, Dr Mifsud Bonnici said that if the Labour Party considered that the EU treaty was not beneficial for Malta it should endeavour to change it.

By so doing it will be following in the party's actions when it had put a lot of effort to change the independence agreement negotiated by Nationalist Prime Minister George Borg Olivier.

Working hard, the MLP had changed the agreement in 1972, after being returned to office, and the Constitution in 1974.

Battling it out, Dr Sant disagreed, saying that the independence agreement was a bilateral agreement. But the EU treaty was a multi-dimensional agreement within an economic club.

"We are members of a club and you cannot change the rules of the club on a bilateral basis."

The retort from Dr Mifsud Bonnici was that negotiations were carried out directly with the EU and not with the other member states.

"All we have to do is that the club accepts that the treaty should not make life miserable in Malta," he said.

The delegates had a duty to decide on this issue and could wash their hands of it by going by the decision of the party executive.

"Malta is already a member of the EU and it is now a question of changing that treaty," Dr Mifsud Bonnici said.