Down Argentina way?

In several British ex-colonies, independence brought in its wake tribal warfare, massacres, looting and even complete chaos.

In Malta we were spared these widespread atrocities but neither was it "roses, roses all the way" especially during the period that the police force seemed to have shortened its motto to Dom Dirige Nos.

Since Independence, mostly because of profligate Nationalist governments, we have now accumulated a debt in the region of Lm1,600 million (including that of parastatal bodies) notwithstanding that for several decades previously we had a favourable balance of payments (due to the so-called "invisible exports") and a superior standard-of-living to most, if not all, our immediate Mediterranean neighbours.

According to reputable economists, a redeeming feature of this debt is that it is mostly in the local currency and as such, the government and the Central Bank have the power and means to rectify matters. Now that the people have decided to join the EU, the government, in its turn' has decided to ditch the local currency and adopt the euro at the earliest possible opportunity. As the EU is more of a democratic institution, the needs and wishes of the majority take precedence over those of the minority.

In such a motley congregation of nations as the EU, it is not hard to perceive occasions when EU decisions, especially those of the EU Central Bank, are beneficial to the major countries and deleterious to the minor ones, especially when the honeymoon years are over. Therefore, would Malta be reverting to the former status when it depends on the benevolence of other countries if we, too, are not to go "down Argentina way"?