The poll on timesofmalta.com posed the question: "Who would you like to (see) win the MLP leadership election?" Up to the time of writing there have been 1,402 votes cast, out of which a resounding 51.9 per cent have been given to George Abela, 23.3 per cent to Joseph Muscat, 12 per cent to Michael Falzon, 6.5 per cent to Marie Louise Coleiro Preca and 6.3 per cent to Evarist Bartolo.
The results so far reflect the opinion of the types who use PCs as an integral part of their working life and, therefore, I would never take a poll like this to be truly representative of the entire rank and file of the population. Despite that, it all depends on the socio-economic and educational background of the MLP delegates who have taken it upon themselves alone to bear the weight of such an onerous decision. Would timesofmalta.com poll respondents include these delegates? Or is it just people like myself who want an eventual change in government for the sake of preserving democracy who have been clicking happily on the button next to Dr Abela's name? That remains to be seen.
We have been given an electoral promise for all 365 days of the year in a scenario that, with the escalating oil prices, is hardly conducive to that elusive "feel good" factor so necessary to fulfill them. Because of this, everything else in our daily lives will surely be affected. As Marie Antoinette is erroneously quoted as saying, we will soon have to eat cake while the price of the Maltese loaf, once the subsidy goes, will join the list of luxuries on our grocery list. What with bus drivers threatening to strike because they refuse to allow their buses to be tested for harmful emissions and the contradictory vagaries of Mepa threatening to engulf the government like the serpents that devoured Laocoon, I would not, believe me, wish to be in the Prime Minister's shoes for all the beef in Argentina.
One cannot help wondering what it is that galvanises politicians to take up the sport in the first place. I cannot but conclude that they must be gluttons for punishment especially when in government. Once elected, the incumbents have to be all things to all men and please everybody while trying to keep the good ship Malta afloat! Now you know and I know that this is utterly impossible and the result is that in the last 25 years we have seen governments voted in and voted out by default.
Were the 365 electoral promises what clinched the election? I wonder. Therefore, pragmatically speaking, I would rather be in Alfred Sant's shoes, being paid handsomely for the luxury of amusing himself by goading the government with a daily regimen of barbs and darts, ink bombs and stink bombs from the comfort of his "armchair".
So where does that leave us, the electorate? Things are certainly not looking rosy and, unless we are in a position to import nuclear energy at a competitive price from either Sicily or Libya instead of fossil fuel, we are certainly going to feel the pinch. The price hike on bread and surcharges alone will place a huge dampener on the waning post-election euphoria. And, yet, should Dr Muscat or Dr Abela, Mrs Coleiro Preca, Mr Bartolo or Dr Falzon be the next Prime Minister in 2013 would they be able to cushion us from the consequences of a global crisis?
In five years' time it will probably be the MLP's turn to be gluttons for punishment with the responsibility of fulfilling their own electoral promises. The only difference is that they will always be able to squirm out of most of them by blaming the state of the depleted PN-administered public coffers which is what the MLP did in 1996. Therefore, my friends, remember to take MLP electoral promises with a pinch of salt, whoever may make them.
Not so the PN electoral promises. When a party has been in power for almost 20 years, give or take the 1996 to 1998 blip, the promises it makes must surely be based on sound and sober knowledge of the financial and infrastructural limitations of its own previous legislature. Therefore, there is nothing much it can renege upon, is there? Logically, that's what one would conclude. However, when one realises that our spanking new Mater Dei Hospital is not solar powered one starts dreaming of donkeys with two tails, cows jumping over the moon and cats running away with the spoon!
As a parting shot I would remind the St Julians local council that I still expect an apology for the nightmare of May 1 along with a promise that those 12 excruciating hours of horrendous noise pollution will never ever be repeated.
kzt@onvol.net