No tears for democracy

In my last piece here, I wrote that there was only one question which we need to answer: Does the government command a parliamentary majority?

… our Prime Minister, seeing that he does not have the required strength in Parliament, has run to the comfort zone of his party instead...- Helena Dalli

Since then, there have been nine hours of talk in Parliament but not one member addressed this question. As predicted, we listened to long-winded speeches full of cant about this government’s work. Nothing to do with the question being put.

Anyhow, when we came to the vote, the answer was given: the government lost its majority in Parliament.

Since then there have been countless talk shows on radio and television with the Nationalist side skirting around the most important aforementioned fact staring us all in the face. Instead of dealing with this truth, Nationalist speakers switch the debate from the real issue – the government lacking a majority in Parliament – to the Labour Party. Even though it is this majority deficit that could take us to an early election and not what Labour says or does.

The Prime Minister has undergone and is still undergoing attacks from his own side. But it is to the opposition that some Nationalist MPs and the Prime Minister turn: why the motion of no confidence?

Now that the first question has been answered, there is another one awaiting a reply: What has the election/re-election of the Nationalist Party leader got to do with the fact that the Prime Minister lost his majority in Parliament? What is his confirmation as party leader going to prove or change?

If this, up to now, one-man contest were to give Lawrence Gonzi a majority in Parliament, then he would be justified in going for it. But, even though he will get a crushing majority of votes, it will not change one iota of the result he got in Parliament.

The Prime Minister’s first duty is to be accountable to the people and, therefore, the people’s representatives in Parliament and then to the party.

Had Dr Gonzi been serious about this business, he would have asked for a vote of confidence in Parliament like he did after Franco Debono abstained on the motion of censure against Minister Austin Gatt.

What we witnessed this time was the use of the levers of Parliament to make sure that the government holds on to power even though not supported by the will of the majority of the members of Parliament.

So the Prime Minister is advised and at the end of the PN’s general council meeting comes out with a mise-en-scène reminiscent of The Cabinet of Dr Caligari (the setting, not the characters, lest I be accused of implying derangement). Dr Gonzi seeks re-election as party leader.

The incumbent will be “competing” against himself; no one in his or her right mind would challenge Dr Gonzi. Therefore, submitting the party leadership to a secret ballot will help the PN win some more time. It is a ploy to get the foregone overwhelming support from the party councillors, nothing to do with the situation in Parliament and in the rest of the country. Thus, going to the party instead of going to Parliament, tears another veil of deceit, leaving the Prime Minister and his cronies naked for all to see. But what are we to expect from omnipotent moral busybodies – as C.S. Lewis put it in his essay The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment – who believe that this country belongs to them and will do anything to keep things that way.

Lewis wrote about government power in the context of the administration of justice but the concept may be applied to a situation whereby the government acts in a way where we are told that it is for our own good. What’s more, the actions of those wielding political power are even sanctioned by their conscience.

It is thus for our own good that the Prime Minister is underplaying the fact that he does not command a majority in Parliament. It is for our own good that Dr Gonzi has gone off to seek the support of his party instead of addressing the real problem. This, from the same people who used to tell us that personal agendas can be detrimental to liberty.

No tears for democracy this time.

They used to tell us that a democracy is all about the strength to govern. But our Prime Minister, seeing that he does not have the required strength in Parliament, has run to the comfort zone of his party instead, where he is sure to get all the adulation and support he wants. That won’t change the national situation; damage to state and society will continue.

Dr Gonzi has gone to the party for a delusional game of smoke and mirrors, a diversion to keep people and the media occupied while time passes. This will give the Nationalist government and party ample breathing space in which to continue putting their power of incumbency to good party use.

Dr Dalli is shadow minister for the public service and gender equality.