A golden cage

Abdelkader Zitouni is a friend. We have dined together. More than that we have shared a political experience. At the Geneva Congress of the European Green Party, I was of service to him in bringing the plight of his party, Tunisie Verte, to the attention of the congress which expressed its solidarity with our North African sister party in a press release.

It does not sound impressive but in fact it represents a precious lifeline not only for the Greens at both ends of it but also for a much wider public probably unaware of these developments and of their significance. Ironically, it is also an asset for some who oppose such friendship to the best of their ability.

An EGP press release was denounced in the Tunisian press and our Tunisian friends were characterised as traitors. The EGP expression of concern at the refusal of the Tunisian Home Affairs Ministry to acknowledge the existence of Tunisie Verte and the creation of a stooge "Green Party" in Tunisia is nothing of the sort. It is the inevitable response to such events.

In a more recent development, the Tunisian authorities did their utmost to prevent a joint press conference between Arnold Cassola in his capacity as an Italian MP and Mr Zitouni. Last week saw a flurry of e-mails noting the need to request permission for the event, then the refusal with the ominous comment attached that the Tunisian authorities would not like something unpleasant to happen to a Maltese citizen in view of the excellent relations between our two countries.

It sounded so very familiar: reference to foreign interference and statements that could not be interpreted as anything but threats. The Maltese know all about it. Dr Cassola travelled to Tunisia and met Mr Zitouni who had been obliged to confirm in writing that the press conference would not be held. Nonetheless, the police were out in force in front of the Tunisie Verte office when he arrived and effectively prevented anyone but Dr Cassola and Mr Zitouni from entering it.

If anyone in Malta is tempted to point fingers at Tunisia, they would do well to examine their own situation first. In Malta anyone may meet anyone and hold any press conference they like and most people tend to find that we are up to scratch on freedom of assembly and freedom of expression. In fact, we are not.

The so-called pluralism in broadcasting introduced in the early 1990s is a travesty of what it should be. Nowhere else in the EU is it possible to find political parties owning their own TV stations. Nowhere else in the EU can one find a situation in which two parties participate in such an anomaly while the third appears on screen by invitation only. This is not Tunisia, it's little Tunisia.

Since 1981, Tunisia has had a system of government that has all the trappings of democracy without the full experience. That year democratic elections were held which would have ousted the ruling party. The results were not allowed to have their effect. Since then Tunisia has had an ersatz opposition and real political opposition whether democratic or otherwise has been vigorously suppressed. In contrast to all this, Tunisia places high as a partner of the EU in North Africa in the Euro-Med process, as a third country with an association agreement and as a North African economy forging ahead in various sectors, including tourism. It is another illusion.

It is virtual reality as that obtaining in Malta which qualified by the Copenhagen Criteria on democracy regardless of the fact that all political parties agree that the electoral system as operated creates a democratic deficit. We have been discussing electoral reform without registering any progress for over a decade. We will hold the next election with everybody knowing that the country's third political party, The Greens, will contest under severe handicap. It is an attempted denial of the country's political reality as evidenced by events in Tunis last week.

Nobody in the EU should lecture Tunisia or any other country on its system of government unless one is prepared to have a long hard look at democratic deficits existing within EU member states and within the EU structure itself.

Those of us who strive for political development within the EU may have firmer ground to stand on. For us, the democratic basics, including the safeguard of fundamental human rights, are not a distant, lofty ideal but a sine qua non. To waffle about it may be a convenient stratagem but also one that can be extremely costly and dangerous in the long run.

The suppression of basic rights in any state only causes the build-up of tensions and political pressure. The postponement of pluralism through the manoeuvring and dirty tricks of the 2003 election in Malta allows the social, cultural and economic stagnation of Malta to persist. The fact that the EU continues to ignore the situation in Malta as it does in several other member states old and new does not augur well for the future of the Union. The inability of the EU to give itself a structure fully in tune with the democratic standards set out in its charter and with its core driving force, is a fundamental defect.

In ignoring similar defects in partner states, the EU not only devalues the relationship but also exposes its own progress to delay and digression. In the case of Tunisia there is much more: it is one of very few countries in the region that clearly displays a potential for political development in a manner to which the EU can relate. To turn a blind eye to democratic reversals and to foster economic progress bereft of democratic development is to allow the pressures to build and the future to become ever more uncertain.

If Tunisia were a book we are all reading, what can we expect the next chapter to hold? More of the same? If the present policy of countries such as France, the US and the EU itself are to sustain the present regime in fear of a fundamentalisation of North Africa, can they reasonably expect such a policy to hold good forever? Is it not clear that in the long term it is bound to fail and more likely to produce the result it is supposed to avoid?

The persistent rejection of the basic political rights of a democratic political party such as Tunisie Verte may possess no earthshaking quality in the geopolitical calculations of the great and powerful. However, it constitutes irrefutable evidence of the direction in which the country is heading.

For what it is worth, this article makes it clear to anyone in Tunisia who may care to read it that some people feel they owe respect only to those who act respectably; that no matter what they may do to suppress and disguise their political reality, their very acts of suppression speak very loudly about it; that there is a cost and a growing cost for undemocracy.

I believe that I am far from being alone in thinking this way.

The same applies to Malta. In many ways we have made ourselves a joke. All political parties agree that there exists a crying need for the democratisation of our electoral system and yet the two parties in Parliament, which alone can change it, are preparing to contest the next election in circumstances they know to be defective. Our broadcasting situation is simply laughable, it would have brought down the undiluted ire of the EU had the same situation obtained with regard to commercial competition. Imagine a vendor of any product you care to imagine being allowed to advertise only on invitation while the competition goes at it day and night 24/7.

If the EU were to wake up and tell us to put our house in order, if it were to remember the Copenhagen Criteria and give them some meaning, there would not be a few in Malta who would get their backs up. They would become very nationalistic and resent the scolding. They would react in the manner of the Tunisian press. They may condemn me and those who agree with me as traitors bringing their country into disrepute. They would be as completely off the mark as their Tunisian counterparts: economic success without democratic development is no success at all. The most golden of cages is still a prison.

Dr Vassallo is chairman of Alternattiva Demokratika.