Pierre Portelli, president, PN Administrative Council, Pietà
Labour out of context in today's reality
Since taking over the leadership of the Labour Party, Joseph Muscat has been advocating what he calls a movement for moderate and progressive citizens. It is understandable that following years of uninterrupted defective Labour leaders, Dr Muscat wants to let everyone know that he is of a different breed, but does he really believe that attracting floaters, pale blue or even red sceptics, is where he should have started from?
What Dr Muscat is suggesting to moderate and progressive voters is that they should join his fold just because he's new on the block. His "new" movement is predominantly made up of the MLP which until a year and a half ago gave a good run to the Nationalist Party and nearly toppled it from power. So it only stands to reason that his "new" movement aims at adding numbers to what the PL already is.
This implies that Dr Muscat believes that nothing is wrong with the PL today or before for that matter. Nothing to change but for a few names, posts and stationary. So all those considering forming part of Dr Muscat's movement must do so by accepting that they (the moderates) have been wrong all along these years and now it's time to join the PL lock, stock and barrel.
Basically Dr Muscat is asking those who did not vote Labour in the past two decades to embrace his party for one reason: Himself.
In his claims to sell the "new" movement for moderate and progressive citizens, Dr Muscat tries to bring about urgency for its existence.
He uses phrases and battle cries stolen from the days when President Emeritus Eddie Fenech Adami, fondly known to all as Eddie, created such a movement. However, what Dr Muscat ignores is the fact that it wasn't only Eddie's great charisma to attract thousands of leftist minded voters to march with him, but the climate in which he created that movement.
The reason why conservatives and Labourites felt comfortable forming part of the same chain of resistance back in the 1970s and 1980s was to reject Mintoffianism; and Eddie was seen by all as the antithesis of that "ideology". Today, Dr Muscat wants the moderates to join his PL while embracing Dom Mintoff back in the party. In doing so he is telling us: Alfred Sant was wrong on Mr Mintoff, you were wrong on the PL but now I'm giving you the chance to join us and for my sake I will rename us all - A Movement for Moderate and Progressive Citizens!
In his first days at the helm of the PL, most of us believed that Dr Muscat would be a new page in our political history.
A new page which should have started off by setting the record straight. Clear apologies for what the humble worker's party of Pawlu Boffa became in the 1980s. True recognition that the MLP was wrong in trying to keep Malta out of the EU and not merely accepting membership out of default. Following that, one would have expected the new Labour leader to start rebuilding Labour policies on today's realities and not just advocating nostalgic slogans in an attempt to take advantage of those who at the moment might feel politically stranded.
Eddie's movement was built to restore freedom of expression, justice and the economy from a malice that was suffocating us all. What is Dr Muscat aiming to achieve with his movement? A simple change in power, which is OK as long as democracy dictates it but the substance behind its motive is evidently lacking. In this scenario, Dr Muscat's movement is out of context in today's reality.
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Pierre Portelli
Feb 1st 2010, 14:34
Dear Noel, I would appreciate if you could really provide proof to your statement. Regards
Pierre
Noel Cutajar
Jan 24th 2010, 08:36
If Pierre Portelli really believes that the PN was behind the 'new' movement and made Malta what it is today, may he explain or answer the following question...if you really believe that the PN was a liberal and democratic movement, how can you explain that from 1987 till present I was a victim of political intolerance when I applied for jobs? Details can be provided...so in the end who is out of context in today's reality...in this case it is me who believed in this new PN's 'new' movement...
Charles J. Buttigieg
Jan 23rd 2010, 17:44
@ Joseph M Muscat
Re branding is a sign of forward looking, the PN’s black colour on the background of its outdated insignia clearly illustrates mediocrity and the pride of belonging to the extreme right during the life and times of Benito Mussolini.
You are so much out of sync that you day dream that the PN still enjoys the lion’s share of the popular support. Let me remind you my good friend that at the last count the PL garnered 55% and your Gonzipn a miserable 40%.
You can’t read and hear what Joseph Muscat’s alternative proposals are because you only follow your party media. Personally I’d like to see Gonzipn adopting a few suggestions out of the many alternatives the PL offers on a daily bases and are regularly ignored or ridiculed by an administration which only obliges when put at gun point. J. Pullicino Orland and Franco Debono are being more effective to get their ways than the opposition because they hold that precious vote without which support your Gonzipn will fade away in thin air.
Joseph M Muscat
Jan 23rd 2010, 15:02
Calling back best before date members to form a Progressive Movement is like turning the hands of the clock backwards and the result would not be that progressive but regressive; Giving your party a new name a new flag is showing that it faltered when it wanted to deliver; what the Partit Laburista is doing now is trying its best to topple the majority of votes that the Nationalist Party holds over it1 Well as they say every drop counts so even if it comes to selling your soul you are welcomed to the Partit Laburista; but what's in a name my friend;. I am still waiting to read or hear what Joseph Muscat' s alterantives are to what the Natinalist Party is doing to see our Country progressing in every sphere!!!
J Martinelli
Jan 23rd 2010, 14:31
@ Muscat Pat
" Take the Freeport extension for example..." Don't you know that your Party voted with the government, approving the Freeport extension?
"Take the ODZ, the Outside Development Zones" Can't you admit that all the fuss was not the replacing a collapsed building with a new structure on the same footprint that the fuss was all about but rather WHO owned the property?
"Take the black sooth saga". As if the black soot is a recent phenomenon! In the Dockyard's heyday, toxic soot was a daily occurrence especially around the three cities. Was any fuss raised then? Why not?
"And what about the "recession" wan.t hit us, as uttered by Dr Tonio Fenech" That is a flat lie. Mr. Fenech NEVER said that the recession will not hit us but rather that the recession will not hit us as hard since we did not have to bail out the banks like other countries had to. You really demonstrate your ignorance of what other countries are going through. Only when you do you start to appreciate how well Malta is coping!
@ Victor Laiviera
How do you know that those flown from abroad were all Nationalists?
Charles J. Buttigieg
Jan 23rd 2010, 14:26
@ Pierre Portelli
If public opinion is something to go by, since Joseph Muscat became leader, the PL increased its popular support from 48% to 55% and still growing contrary to your Gonzipn which inherited a 52% power base from EFA to see your new Boss reducing it to 40% and still sliding. Let’s face it Pierre this is your real problem, trying to solve it by outdated rhetoric shows that you do not know your onions. Had you been employed in a commercial entity your bosses would send you to learn some basics in strategic planning. A good command in public speaking, which you have, would not suffice.
My apologies for being personal but somebody had to do it, besides you are in politics and if you learned how to dish it out it shouldn’t be so difficult to learn how to receive it.
James Grech
Jan 23rd 2010, 14:18
@Mr Portelli
Let's assume that I am one of these moderate voters. Your article criticises the PL's role and its fine for me, I'm interested in knowing as much as possible so that eventually I will make an intelligent decision. However I try to also find some concrete comparisons with the present administration and its role in today's reality. Strangely enough there is none. You only mention people that were active, people that contributed to our country. Am I to understand that you're not very keen on making references to the present government and party which you represent so highly? How am I to make an intelligent decision, once an election is due, if I am not reminded with i) the cries of many associations calling upon gov to intervene into the destruction of valleys by ODZ development? ii) the sense of overwhelming corruption, consider the delimara power plant extension, the vat scam, contractors being awarded hefty contracts without having the necessary attributes iii) the cries of many families and associations, in relation to the utility tariffs. How can I take your article seriously if it does nothing to show how the PN is keeping within context in today's reality?
Muscat. Pat
Jan 23rd 2010, 12:48
Malta,s realities and context are not, am afraid, the standard benchmark of modern European nation. Take the Freeport extension for example, European sustainable projects demand that the social, economic, the environmental, considerations are not mutually exclusive, and yet, Dr Gonzi simply ignored the social and did no "djalogu" with the stakeholders -the people of the South. Is this the reality that Mr Portelli has in mind?
Take the ODZ, the Outside Development Zones. European policy prohibits building outside the ODZ areas, and yet there were thousands of ODZ buildings issued- the last controversial one, which Mr Portelli I presume knows very well, the Bahrija villa by the ex PN President. Again, are these the "realities" that Dr Joseph Muscat should ignore?
Take the black sooth saga.The Fgura citizens are being taken for a ride, should these people accept the joke that the Prime Minister is still studying the provenance of the sooth....after 10 years?
And what about the "recession" wan.t hit us, as uttered by Dr Tonio Fenech; should we ignore these realities, including of course, the runaway deficits, the runaway waste spree and the unsustainable mountain of debt that catapulted us in the mess Gonzi brought us in?
P. Schembri
Jan 23rd 2010, 11:45
Another one who stands to lose if the PN loses the elections!
Victor Laiviera
Jan 23rd 2010, 11:36
@ Mr Franz Lee Smith
Isn't it strange that a party which "does not exist" anymore can get almost 50% in an election and only lose it because of people flown in from abroad - many of them with no actual right to vote?
Franz Lee Smith
Jan 23rd 2010, 10:27
Mr. Portelli is right. This movement Joe Muscat is advocating is only a farytale. Are people so blind to realise that the socialist party doesn't exist anymore? Yes only the PN is the correct answer, and the only true party for all maltese of all generations.