Muscat tells delegates he does not represent anybody else

Trust the author of the Penny Lampoon Popular Pamphlet to grab each opportunity to defend his/her hero at all costs to the extent of presenting incongruent arguments couched in incomprehensible language.

@ Victor Laiviera
My dear friend and ex-classmate,
No other prospective candidate for the MLP leadership except Joseph Muscat has been reported or felt it necessary to make such a blatant statement. Have you wondered why this is so? I would say that it is because each one of them, once elected, would be his own man ( or woman in the case of M.L Coleiro Preca ) and be able to stand on one's own feet. Muscat felt it necessary to make this declaration to put his supporters' minds at rest that despite the well known fact that the MLP inner circle including Dr Sant and Dr George Vella are actively pushing forward his candidature, he is claiming that he wants to be his own man and no one else's. Only time and circumstances can vouch for this claim, but judging from past experience.........................
Surely you can read between the lines whenever such declarations are made publicly.


@ Maria Pace

You have stated that Joseph Muscat was elected MEP with his own style. If by that you mean that he took unfair advantage of the exposure and popularity gained from conducting a vitriolically anti-EU membership TV programme called "Made in Brussels" that continously poked fun and belittled EU institutions in order to receive the highest number of votes from MLP supporters, I will agree with you 100%. When you mentioned that this worked brilliantly, I suppose you were referring to the opportunistic methods he employed to get elected.

No one can forget that following the MLP defeat at the 2003 Referendum and General Elections, Muscat was accredited at having performed a sensational 360 degree U-turn to transform himself from a convinced and declared Eurosceptic to materialize into a budding, enterprising young Europhile. St Paul's miraculous conversion to Christianity on his way to Damascus pales into insignificance when compared to Muscat's abrupt, complete and diametrically opposed change of tune.

@ A Daley
you state "PN have already gone into a frenzy with the prospects of Dr. Muscat becoming Leader. The other issue is that with this MLP Leader, this Govt. will be very short lived!"

Stop dreaming! The PN would love nothing better than JM being elected leader. Just look at surveys of where the floating voter preferences lie and you would know that JM scores very low where it matters.

Imagine five years down the road. If Gonzi performs well in this leglislature, and Labour have to assume that, the floating voter will have to choose between a strong pair of proven hands and an inexperienced man with no executive experience. The choice would be clear and Labour will stay as a permanent fixture in opposition.

JM is the favourite candidate of the outgoing leadership and he does not have what it takes to shake off their patronage. If he did he would now that the interest of the party are not congruent with his becoming Leader.

I am writing to express my delight at Joseph Muscat standing for Leader of our Party and to pledge my wholehearted support to him and his campaign, I share so many of his values and am delighted someone is standing with whom people like myself can identify.

I have never emailed a politician before but felt compelled to send one to Mr. Muscat and bid him good luck in the leadership race that I consider he deserves to win having found the star quality within him to communicate his sentiment in a highly engaging way, he has touched me and will surely touch others. I look forward to politics becoming more meaningful for me with him around.

Dr Muscat has already shown that he has the charisma energy and dedication to become a great leader. How the nationalist leaning public can be so four square against his becoming the next leader is merely an illustration of how well people‘s opinions can be manipulated by the media. At the moment he is being targeted viciously by the nationalist media outlets (not to mention a number of prominent nationalist die hard columnists) in a concerted campaign of character assassination, based mainly on insinuations and half truths. The next leader of the opposition be it Muscat, Abela, Falzon, Bartolo, or Coleiro Preca, can all expect the same treatment. The problem is plain and simple the imbalance which exists in the local media.

@ Corinne Vella, why do you always have to spin words your own way to change the meaning of a sentence? Why don't you be fair and take the phrase you quoted in its contest?
@A. Dalli: Read the interview J. Muscat had on the Sunday paper ILLUM. That will satisfy your concern.
@Liam: Well said!!
I think the GonziPN government should focus on hoe to tackle the current serious problems this country is facing. Also, the GonziPN should see through the number of pre-electoral promises it made which after 3 months have already been broken. The PN media is focussing on the Labour leadership contest so as to distract attention from the current deteriortin situation in this lost-hope country.

Irrespective of the so called opinion polls which certain sections of the media - including the Times - organise, you Joseph has the best chance to lead the Party and i augur you for the future. Remember that the cannon balls are always directed at the most potential candidate and so ignore the percentages and carry on with your initiatives. Come next June and we will have you as our Leader - something the Nats. will do their utmost to prevent it happening.

Trust the champion of the cheap shot to pounce on any opportunity to snipe at any implied criticism of his hero.

I Understand that this thing of the leader is an MLP issue after all they will be making a change of there mentality by making some one new as leader. But many forget that since in Malta we have only two major parties it becomes a national issue, because the opposition leader is there
also to oppose the Government. I fair that with all this fuss and shows and media hunger for something new happening around it's making us losing focus on what is really important for the country. The fact that party A has a greater leader then party B or that we have to move forward by facing what is really the problem of now a days.
There is the need for the parliament to work in synchronization not creating dilemmas just for the sack of it. energy is the biggest problem right now. not only for us but for the whole world we have politions that are not looking towards solutions but towards short terms mind gimmicks and i am afraid that the new MLP will consolidate this problem by opposing everything instead of making somethings good in the time passed and paid by the government to be in the opposition. I hope that Both the Government and the Opposition stop discriding each others as enemies . that is childish and ignorant. not mature at all.

I attended Joseph's meeting last night and he blew me away. I have no doubt that he is the right man for the job and no matter what happens I would love to see the five candidates united as one team - a message that is always conveyed by Joseph. The Malta Labour Party needs to change. That much is obvious. However, change does not come about by kicking everybody out all and sundry. That just creates cliques and more enemies and it will be back to square one. They say the PN are in deep support for a particular candidate so as to make Labourites desist from electing him (some kind of reverse psychology). I say they are in deep support for a particular candidate because they have the intention and the scope to create splits. Well thats just not gonna happen so keep trying if you wish. Oh...and allow me to use their common rhetoric: Why doesn't the PN deal with the country's economic, social and environmental problems instead of enjoying an undeserved honeymoon dictating what the MLP ought to be? Prove to us that: kollox fis-sod: finanzi fis-sod, familji fis-sod, ambjent fis-sod - and that we live in the most democratic country in the world.

I am sure that at the Dar Centrali in Pieta the NP big heads are saying that the MLP delegates can elect who they want as party leader except George Abela. Without G.Abela leading the MLP the chances for the NP to win the next election will not remain at 0%

The leader the Labour Party needs, and the Prime Minister the Maltese deserve.

I am a party paid up member and , yes , I am proud and looking forward in having Joseph Muscat as my leader .

Dr. Muscat insisted that the Prime Minister could not use the current global economic problems as an excuse not to keep his electoral promises. The PN had known before the election what was on the horizon, yet had still made its promises. Dr Muscat said the MLP should expose all attempts at deception by the government, while also preparing its own proposals for the future.
This is the man we desperately need in Malta. A man that holds the Govt. to account in all that it does. A man afraid of the Govt. when one tries to protect the vulnerable and being accused of damaging the country.
PN have already gone into a frenzy with the prospects of Dr. Muscat becoming Leader. The other issue is that with this MLP Leader, this Govt. will be very short lived!

To many party members leading with your style is not enough. First you have to promise to get rid of the old failing party brass.

Joseph Muscat is his own man, not anyone's puppet, being it any other politician or businessman. he is there working with people for the people. his last four years as an mep gave a very fruitful outcome to all those who needed him, where he served them without giving any second thought because of who they were. This is the sort of leader, or indeed prime minister that our country deserves. We are fed up being fooled by the usual politicians, where before the elections we are promised gold, and after the elections, we are given hell. Joseph muscat is proving to be different.

Trust Corinne Vella to give the worst possible interpretation to the words.

What a childish cheap shot.

I believe Dr.Muscat when he claims that a vote for him is truly a vote for him...Joseph Muscat always had his own style. That is how he went to the European Parliament...with his own style...and it worked brilliantly!

I fully agree with Dr. Muscat that he considers all the leadership contenders as his colleagues, and the only political adversary is Lawrence Gonzi.

But Dr. Muscat must admit that the present defeated administration, including Dr. Sant, Dr. George Vella and few others, prefer Dr. Muscat to be the next MLP leader, because among them there are few of them that they are very comfortable in opposition.

All surveys carried out by all the independent newspapers and the independent media shows clearly that Dr. Muscat has a very low preference among the floating voters.

So that's why Dr. Sant & Co are pushing Dr. Muscat to be the next leader ??????????

"A vote for Joseph is a vote for Joseph, no one else." That is precisely to what many people object. Self-serving 'leadership' has been the hallmark of the MLP for too long. It's time for a different outlook.