Myth, reality and deceit

In politics, the distinction between myth and reality is occasionally purposely blurred; some recent statements by Labour spokesmen and leaders cannot go unheeded for they distort history and create legends, which, if not rebutted, can transform themselves into reality.

I shall attempt to rebut two of the more obvious statements that have appeared recently and been repeated ad nauseam even by those who do not mean to mislead.

Myth number 1: Nationalists MPs did not agree to a pairing arrangement when Alfred Sant was Prime Minister (1996-98). This is a blatant lie. It is so blatant that Labour is only daring to make this false statement now, 10 years after Labour's defeat at the polls in 1998.

In November 1996, a Nationalist parliamentary group meeting was called by Eddie Fenech Adami. We discussed the issue and a clear majority was in favour of granting pairing as a sign of goodwill to the new government chosen by the Maltese people and pairing was granted.

During much of the 22 months of a Labour government, particularly during the 1997 budget debate, pairing was given as a matter of course and this in spite of dubious absences in Parliament from the government side. Pairing was only withdrawn when, in a fit of spite and folly, Dr Fenech Adami, then Leader of the Opposition, was, on the insistence of the then Labour government, forced to attend Parliament to pilot an opposition motion even though his doctor had instructed him to spend a period of rest at home owing to a potentially serious medical condition.

Coming months after Labour had settled into power, this action was a proportionate response to a callous move, unheard of in the annals of our parliamentary history.

If there had not been any pairing agreement, as Labour spokesmen are now claiming, why did the Nationalist opposition withdraw something which it had never given? Labour had actually issued a press statement in 1997 condemning the withdrawal of pairing; excellent proof, if any were needed, that pairing was in force then.

Myth number 2: The second myth doing the rounds is even more atrocious. Writing in The Times (July 14), the new Labour leader said that Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca`s nomination to the Maltese parliamentary delegation to the Council of Europe "means that Malta will now have at least one female parliamentarian representing it and will again be able to vote. The government had, over the past years, failed to make such an appointment".

While I might accept that the Labour leader might have made a mistake due to his lack of experience, the same cannot be said of those who have been in the Maltese Parliament for years and now happily repeat what their new leader has said.

In the past legislature, three female MPs sat on the government bench. They were all appointed to the front bench, two as Cabinet ministers and one as parliamentary secretary. Ministers and parliamentary secretaries are not normally appointed to the Parliamentary Assembly. Labour had three female MPs and, though it was free to do so, did not appoint any of them to the parliamentary delegation to the Assembly and this in spite of repeated calls from the government side to do so. Labour stuck to its all-male representation and, in order to retain the Maltese delegation's voting powers, the government was constrained to send a front bencher, namely Helen D`Amato, as a member of the parliamentary delegation.

Following the opening of the new legislature last May, the government again asked the opposition to appoint one of its four female MPs on the delegation to the Council of Europe since the only two Nationalist female MPs formed part of the Cabinet. Labour again refused to do so and the government again had to appoint one of its two female Cabinet ministers to the delegation to avoid loss of the delegation's voting powers.

Now that Labour has, after five years, appointed a female MP to the delegation, Labour's new leader has patted himself on the back and, what is worse, accused the government of failing to guarantee female participation in the past!

Is this the new season which is being ushered? I hope not, otherwise it would be a season of opportunism, deceit and outright lies. But I am a born optimist and am confident that this temporary lapse of memory will not be a tedious recurrence.

Dr Borg is Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs.