Will Malta Shipyards end up being sold for real estate?

The government has shown it wants to keep on playing the same game with the shipyards' privatisation: the annoying tactic of playing the victim which has been going on for more than 20 years.

Minister Tonio Fenech condemned the GWU for choosing confrontation while the government has set the worst timing possible for the privatisation. It knew well enough that the subsidies would have to stop by the end of this year and yet launched the retirement schemes only a few weeks ago.

To add ridicule to tragedy, it offered an incentive to those workers who would go for one of the schemes before the end of next month.

If the government ever wanted to be taken seriously, it should have offered workers the options a year ago. This did not happen because the interests of a political party on the eve of a general election are much more important than the livelihood of 1,700 workers. 1,700 is a number higher than the amount of votes the party in office holds as a relative majority.

I attended the GWU meeting in Paola where Tony Zarb mentioned the possibility that the 'yards would be offered for real estate. Minister Fenech tended to add proof to this thesis indirectly when stating that "such confrontational and threatening behaviour (by the GWU) could only hinder the prospects of interest shown by potential operators" and that "unless interest was shown by potential investors by September 15, it (the government) would have no option but to declare failure in the privatisation process and the shipyards be declared bankrupt".

Instead of showing the huge assets, be they equipment or skilled labour, that the 'yards have, the government is devaluing the same entity it is so eager to sell, by choosing the worst discourse possible.

The Times report of the Paola meeting left out the most important statements uttered by the speakers. One of them was by Paul Bugeja, who asked the government to publish the 'yards' accounts of these past four years to see whether they are bankrupt. Something, he said, that the government does not want to do.

The perceived reality that the shipyards siphon off taxpayers' money is spinned by most of the opinion writers. They would like to make us forget the pre-electoral direct orders given by the government. The best way we could have dealt with the 'yards would have been that of changing the management and its targets.

It seems that making the shipyards more productive and increasing profits were never part of the agenda. The government's aim is to hinder workers' unity. But thanks to the GWU, solidarity remains alive and well among workers.