Defeat report stirs anger within the Labour Party

The report analysing Labour's March 8 election defeat drew an angry reaction from a number of party officials, one of whom went as far as to call it vitiated.

"It is clear that the report is vitiated especially where the electoral office is mentioned," the party's vice-president and electoral office head Louis Gatt said in a seven-page response posted on the party's website yesterday.

Leadership hopeful Michael Falzon said the document is "biased" against the electoral office, of which he too forms part, aware that it may influence delegates voting in the June 5 election for Labour leader.

The reaction more or less mirrored what sources described as the "angered position" both Mr Gatt and Dr Falzon took at the national executive meeting, which convened yesterday morning to discuss the report. It was held on the same day the contents of the 99-page document were revealed by The Times.

Sources present at the meeting said that at one point Dr Falzon even said he thought the report had been tampered with, but he later clarified that he meant that the facts he had relayed to the commission were either not present in the report or were misrepresented.

Dr Falzon also said he had drawn attention to the fact that the partner of a female member of the commission that carried out the report ran a blog that was very critical of him. The authors of the report were Carm Borg, Godfrey Pirotta, Carmen Sammut Renée Laiviera and Joe Borg.

In the main, the report paints a picture of a fragmented and disorganised party machine, which ignored a carefully-planned campaign strategy, approved unanimously by the party's administration last year in the run-up to the March 8 general election.

The document rarely singles out individuals for blame. However, the campaign was largely in the hands of the strategy group which was made up of the party's leadership - Alfred Sant, his deputies Charles Mangion and Dr Falzon, general secretary Jason Micallef and party president Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi.

The electoral office is criticised for not being proactive and of knowingly having incorrect data, among other things, which is what triggered the reaction of Mr Gatt and Dr Falzon.

Dr Falzon is mentioned directly for what is described as a unilateral decision by his party to extend the voting time by an hour on election day - a move which some in the MLP believe favoured the Nationalist Party, which won the election by a mere 1,500 votes.

Contacted yesterday, Dr Falzon said a number of the report's conclusions were untrue. He said he had explained to the commission how the voting time extension came about, but his comments were not reflected in the report.

He also insisted that despite being part of the strategy team that practically had the final say on everything related to the campaign, his role was marginal.

"For instance, the report mentions the incident when Michael Woods was invited to Labour's conference before the election. I wasn't aware of that decision," he said.

"I told the party not to erect that billboard with the word 'corruption' because I thought it was in bad taste and libellous. They didn't listen to a deputy leader who also happens to be a lawyer."

He went on with his defence, but would not mention names, even though the reference is obviously directed at Dr Sant and possibly Mr Micallef.

He did mention Dr Sant when he reiterated that he was not given access to the party's surveys. "Whenever I asked to discuss the surveys, and I did this countless times, the leader would say we don't need to discuss surveys unless we're doing badly. The implication is that we're doing well, isn't it? On that note, I never got to see the surveys."

Besides the general picture of badly-run party machinery, the cursory reference to an "overconfident member" of the leadership is aimed at the general secretary, party sources said.

When contacted, however, Mr Micallef would not comment on the findings of the report, which may seriously dent his bid for re-election. In line with the position he had always taken, he said that he would make his reaction to the document known within the party structures.

Dr Zrinzo Azzopardi said he would publicly react to the document in the coming days. The party president is not spared blame since he oversaw the beleaguered party manifesto, which was plagued with mistakes, proving to be an embarrassment rather than an asset during the campaign.

"I think there are certain inaccuracies and misrepresentations which I would like to clarify," he said, stressing that while he was responsible for collating and incorporating the final internal reactions to the document he could not be held responsible for the whole document.

"The document was the product of a lot of work and a lot of people," he said.