Editorial

Was it just a mere slip or intentional that in reporting Tony Zarb's speech at the General Workers' Union's protest in Valletta on Thursday the union's own newspaper, l-orizzont, did not give his key quote, which is: "You either come to the table of discussion or we'll topple you"? One would like to think that the union dropped it because when the heat of the moment was over it immediately realised the seriousness of the implications and connotations of the declaration he made.

But if this is not the case, if, in other words, Mr Zarb, as secretary general of the GWU, still holds to what he said, that his union is prepared to topple the government if it fails to go to the negotiating table with it, then the situation takes a different perspective. It would mean that the union will not be just a privileged partner of the Labour Party but an integral part of it, in the same way it had been when it was statutorily fused with it. At least this is the way many will, no doubt, be reading the situation.

Not that this body-and-soul shift back to politics will be surprising. It will not. Most already see the union as part of the party anyway; the difference is that the GWU will once again be openly playing politics, as it did so many times in the past, both in the time of the Borg Olivier government, when it had paralysed the drydocks until the MLP was returned to power, and, indeed, during the time of Dom Mintoff's administration, when respect to some of the workers' rights was thrown to the wind, with the GWU failing to move a finger in protest.

The comment Mr Zarb made that the union was prepared to topple the government was different from the one he had made earlier in the same speech, to the effect that if the government were not prepared to listen to the people's call it would be the same people who would remove it. Now that is different, far different from the connotation that toppling, as used by Mr Zarb, has. Before going even one millimetre further in his campaign against the government, Mr Zarb has to confirm that his union has no intention of going against the country's democratic rules.

In democratic countries, governments are put in power by the people in free and fair elections. The GWU, like any other trade union or organisation in the country, has every right to express its concern in public, but talk of toppling the government in the manner resorted to by Mr Zarb in a mass union protest is most unwise.

The GWU is accusing the government of showing arrogance in its dealings with it when the union itself is wallowing in a kind of arrogance that is making the people cringe with disgust. It declares war, dishes out threats and warnings by the dozen and, worse, resorts to intimidatory language. In a shade of Winston Churchill's wartime speech, Mr Zarb booms: "We will fight at workplaces, in the streets and in all squares of Malta and Gozo". The country is not amused; it has heard similar declarations before.

Taking the people to the streets, calling industrial action and using such intimidatory language will not help create one new single job. On the contrary, the GWU's campaign threatens to scare away new investment, destabilises the island's economic situation and jeopardises the jobs of hundreds of workers. Is this what the GWU wants? In the interest of its own members and of the workers generally, the union needs to stop and think about its plan of action before it is too late.