Party dance and music

Nationalist strategists were running all the way to the political bank this week, laughing so much their sides were splitting and putting them in stitches. They were beyond themselves at the thought that they had helped in nudging the Labour Party to elect Jason Micallef to stay on as general secretary, and hang the more meaningful managerial and other relevant attributes and experience of Joe Vella Bonnici and Alfred Grixti.

The spinning strategists could hardly believe it: having lost Alfred Sant as their prize asset, at least they retained in hand the main of his minions who had contributed to the nearly-impossible loss of the general election and the spectacle he managed to turn that into.

The PN strategists did their bit, of course they did. It's in their political nature. Also, they had to, knowing the PN will not have many cards to play at the next general election.

They were desperate for the incumbent Labour general secretary to blunder on in office. Using reverse psychology they painted him in all manner of dark colours, intended to make decent Labour delegates swear they would not be bullied by monstrous Nats. They succeeded, but the extent to which the Nationalists did so cannot be gauged, except perhaps by the fact that the sitting general secretary managed to increase his votes by almost half over his success of five years ago.

The background to how that was achieved was broader than the role of the Nationalist spinners, although they were certainly part of it. It was actually a colourful backdrop. It included attacks on Micallef by characters more likely to make an impression than the PN media.

The most striking of them was Leo Brincat, a former minister and sitting MP who had been part of the cabal that overthrew the Lorry Sant party hegemony all of a quarter century ago. The way he went for the Micallef jugular suggested that he had more wind in his sails than his own initiative. A mild-mannered person, he is not given to that sort of frontal aggression, albeit he kept it polite.

If a clearer sign of which way the wind was blowing was required, laying low the hypothesis that Micallef was the new leader's pet and favoured candidate, came via Mario Vella. A former MLP president and an old hand in the party machine, as well one of the inner clutch of gurus behind Joseph Muscat's leadership campaign, he too came out against Micallef's candidature. He did so in a timesofmalta.com blog, not exactly the medium through which to reach the bulk of Labour's delegates. But he provided fodder for the anti-Labour mill to feed upon.

Less prominently, there was a further indicator that Micallef was not quite the Benjamin of the new party leadership. Deckhands who had telephoned individual delegates in the leadership contest to push for Muscat's election last week used their delegates' phone numbers again - this time to urge delegates away from the general secretary in situ.

They did not prevail. All those thrusts were outdone by the cunning charges of some of those who shared a vested interest in keeping Micallef in. They mounted a whispering campaign against Vella Bonnici. They targeted Grixti more viciously, by circulating pictures juxtapositioning him with Nationalist stalwarts and dubbing him their lackey.

When the decisive moment came on Monday, Micallef received a tidy 44 per cent of the votes cast, more than enough to leave his unwisely split opponents floundering. The incumbent general secretary, who had alienated staunch activists during his five-year term, had turned off others by the way he conducted himself during the lost general election and its leadership-contest aftermath, still triumphed.

Where does it all go from here? Muscat gave a clear signal on Tuesday. Addressing delegates, he welcomed the incursion of Brincat against Micallef as a sign of healthy debate. That was yesterday. Looking ahead, the new leader proclaimed there was no room for prima donnas in the party he now led. Micallef must have winced at that - the leader could hardly be construed to be referring to the adversaries he had defeated, genteel loyalists all three of them.

I'd say there will not be as many similar photo opportunities as those circulated by friends of Micallef showing him cheek by jowl with Muscat in the coming months. Expect, however, a firm stand by Toni Abela, even though his close ally Wenzu Mintoff was not elected president.

An early firebrand and rehabilitated outcast, Abela has come a long way, powered by his strong intellectual trappings plus experience from past errors. He will, affably but clearly, mark out his patch and make it clear to the general secretary that he was not elected, against the odds, deputy leader for party affairs to be sidelined like his predecessor Michael Falzon had been.

Both leader and deputy leader will keep the general secretary on a short leash. Anġlu Farrugia, deputy leader for parliamentary affairs and number two in the hierarchy, will not be outdone. He is set to surprise by being more sedate in style than hitherto. His calculations will also encompass a firm eye on the general secretary as well.

Democracy has its own manner of speech. What it has said so far in the MLP's latest chapter of change without change (Evarist Bartolo's cynically clever description) may not be music to the new leader's ears. But neither will it be music to all of those who have danced with joy so far...