Twenty twelve won’t be easy

Fifty one Mondays ago, on January 11, 2010, The Times editorial warned that “it would be justified to say that it has never been more the case that Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi needs to do something about what his government and the Nationalist Party are going through”. One year less a week later, we can safely say that if the Prime Minister has tried to do something about it, that something has been inadequate, insufficient and ineffectual.

My guess is that what is happening reflects a more profound malaise- Mario Vella

With a perfect storm threatening to unleash itself on the eurozone, the European Union and the world economy generally, a national economy as open and vulnerable as Malta’s needs a head of government whose head is totally focused on national priorities. One need not be a PN supporter to demand that Dr Gonzi concentrate all his attention on the dangers for Malta of a possible eurozone meltdown. After all, Dr Gonzi is not, or ought not to be, his party’s Prime Minister. He is, or ought to be, Malta’s Prime Minister and we have a right, as Maltese citizens, to demand a Prime Minister who is fully dedicated to navigating our country in the stormiest international economic conditions since the Great Depression that started in 1929 and lasted for more than 10 years.

I can hear some of you say that the Prime Minister is not alone. He presides over a Cabinet of ministers and is supported by a team of parliamentary secretaries and at least a dozen hand-picked chairmen of public authorities, agencies and corporations that are certainly helping him keep the Maltese economy and public finances afloat no matter how powerful the tempest. You can’t really be serious.

A few of them may be capable or willing or both but who can deny that many of the others are part of the problem rather than of the solution. And the Prime Minister knows this only too well.

On December 3 on Dissett, PBS journalist Reno Bugeja courageously pressed the executive chairman of Malta Enterprise for some answers regarding what value Malta was getting for the taxpayers’ money that is being so liberally poured down our national investment promotion agency. I don’t know if Dr Gonzi found time to watch this programme. How terribly alone he must have felt if he did.

The moral of the tale is that, no, the Prime Minister cannot rely on many others to assist him to ensure that in the months ahead we promote economic growth – the only effective solution if we look further than the tip of our nose – and spend public money prudently and intelligently. That is another reason why we need a Prime Minister that can concentrate on national priorities. He needs to do this now, immediately, and for as long as it gets to steam out of the economic storm.

The problem is, of course, that, like protracted economic recessions and established patterns of public spending, the Franco Debono syndrome won’t go away tomorrow morning.

In my very first regular contribution to The Times, over 100 Mondays ago, on January 19, 2009, observing that “a series of clues of varying significance and magnitude that support the conviction of many that this government may not be standing on solid ground”, I suggested that “anybody with even the most rudimentary of political antennas has intercepted signals that indicate that we are approaching a zone of severe turbulence”.

I had also argued that “international financial crisis, its repercussion on the real economies of our principal markets (…), the impact of all of this on our own real economy, our broke government’s impotence in the face of this crisis, indeed its compounding of the effects of the crisis on our economy” would make Dr Gonzi’s job increasingly difficult. Twenty twelve won’t be easy.

Now, I am not sure what drives Dr Debono’s crusade. In his address to the Parlament taż-Żgħażagħ in August 2009, he told the young guests: “Why are young people looking at the political class in a certain way? I believe that we… the young… should look (at politics) with a critical eye. We shouldn’t spend most of our time saying how well things are going but we should (rather) see what we can do to improve them”.

On the other hand, his later statement that his “loyalty to the party is not only unconditional but also unconditioned” (www.francodebono.info/) does not quite help me to understand the man.

I do know, however, that the whole saga is distracting us from the real problems facing the country but, then, a Prime Minister’s inability to concentrate on national priorities to quell recurring cases of insubordination in his parliamentary group is a real national problem, especially in times such as these and especially when the government’s majority in Parliament is so fragile.

My guess is that what is happening reflects a more profound malaise. “Governments are made possible by alliances… many of the alliances that this government is built on are beginning to come apart” (www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20090119/opinion/no-quantum-of-solace.241342).

Dr Vella blogs at http://watersbroken.wordpress.com .