One can understand where the Prime Minister and the Nationalist Party are coming from in the current political turbulence. Question is where they think they can take the opposition Labour Party and the rest of the country with their insistence to avoid an early election at all costs.

It is hardly convincing that Gonzi cries foul now over tactics he himself had cynically used in 1998- Lino Spiteri

The Nationalists are coming from an ocean of resentment that it had to be one of their own to push them to the brink; to threaten to take out of the Prime Minister’s hands the choice when to call the next general election. Make no mistake about it, that choice would have been exercised according to what Lawrence Gonzi judged would give his party the best chance of winning.

Talk about the national interest is no more than just that – talk. Election dates that, unlike in the United States, are at the discretion of any prime minister are selected solely on partisan considerations. Sanctimonious and hypocritical spouting of the national interest is no more than cheap political spin.

Realistically, the general election has to be called sometime by June next year. Yet the Budget for 2012 was devised in such a way as to give Gonzi the option of calling an election this year, if he calculated that would suit his party best. That would turn on the opinion surveys held regularly by the PN, which by the end of 2011 were telling it that Labour had the edge if the election was called now, or soon.

It would also turn on the reading of where the economy is going, whether it would be badly hit by economic developments abroad, in particular with the eurozone and the United Kingdom, predicted to flirt with a shallow recession.

To give the Prime Minister the option to call the election some months earlier than necessary, the Budget was crafted to massage the disaffected middle income class.

Events, however, scupper even the best-laid plans. The Budget-2012 ploy was weakened by the public transport fiasco and, above all, the resentment by Nationalist MP Franco Debono that his popular criticism and proposals over four years had fallen on deaf ears.

Came the New Year and the Prime Minister’s carefully laid plans were shot to pieces. Debono declared that he no longer had confidence in him, and would not support the government in the House of Representatives.

I am one of those who believe that the threat to withdraw parliamentary support is wrong.

MPs are elected on their party ticket. They owe their seat to it. In the end, however, it is up to the individual MP to decide. And Debono appears to have made an irreversible decision – he has insisted he will not support the Prime Minister, not even on votes of confidence, which include money bills.

All Gonzi’s huffing and puffing, aided and abetted by the PN’s primed dogs of war pouring bile and spleen on Debono, have not made the MP budge an inch from his decision. That being the case the Prime Minister can no longer claim to enjoy a majority in the House. Votes of support from within the party cannot change that current parliamentary reality. Only Debono’s vote for the government on a vote of confidence can change it.

Gonzi, in direct contradiction to his stance after Debono abstained on a vote of confidence in Transport Minister Austin Gatt, was determined not to call for a vote of confidence.

The next money Bill on the House agenda, which also equates to a vote of confidence, was being placed low on the parliamentary agenda, despite its urgency in order to give formal effect to the Budget measures.

That left the confidence issue in the hands of the opposition. On Friday it decided to cut out the cackle and the constitutional farce and presented a motion of no confidence in the government. That, if Franco Debono remains true to his word and is not by some means prevented from voting, could hook the government and herald an early general election.

The opposition taking the initiative seemed to be the preferred Prime Minister’s preferred option. Evidently, he calculated it would be the least damaging to his party, an expected partisan consideration.

If an election is forced, he will hope for a sympathy vote and will tell the country that dastardly Labour was opportunistic in forcing him to the hustings now.

That will be more sanctimonious humbug. Any opposition will act in its best interests, especially at a time when the government’s internal mess is creating uncertainty and instability.

That is precisely what the Nationalist opposition and party did in 1998 when Dom Mintoff rebelled against the Labour government over a resolution concerning development of the Cottonera waterfront, which then Prime Minister Alfred Sant, refusing to live with a monkey on his back, turned into a vote of confidence.

The Nationalist opposition felt no qualms in encouraging Mintoff in his disruptive rebellion. The Nationalist Party, led by Eddie Fenech Adami and Lawrence Gonzi, even gave Mintoff ample television time on its station to enable him to persist with his attacks on the Labour government.

What goes around comes around. It is hardly convincing that Gonzi cries foul now over tactics he himself had cynically used in 1998.

In fact, the more the Nationalists play that card, the less creditworthy will they appear in the eyes of those prepared to look at the unfurling political scene with some detachment.

The dice seem to be loaded. If the no confidence motion passes, or if tyhe Speaker’s casting vote is required, there would be no saying what an early general election will deliver.

At least, though, it would put an end to the growing uncertainty and instability on the island, wrapped up as it is in endless hypocrisy.