Sunday nights herald the onset of back-to work/school blues. The best thing to do is go to bed early to get over the slightly melancholic end-of-weekend feeling. While lots of sensible people did just that, the Labour Party de­cided to hold a sort of Cinderella-in-reverse event, by kicking off its electoral campaign at midnight.

The midnight bash qualifies as one of those irritating electoral gimmicks which politicians would be better off without- Claire Bonello

For some reason, this caused quite a stir (at least online and throughout the media). Journalists acted as if they had been observing a curfew all their lives and that the Labour launch was the first time they were being allowed out past their usual bed time, and assembled at Labour headquarters pens poised at the ready.

In any event, after all that coffee-swigging and stifled yawns, the Great Reveal was a bit of an anti-climax. Joseph Muscat in­formed us that Malta belonged to us all (not just to the shadowy clique), signed off a billboard, and the assembled guests got around to getting some shut-eye.

I don’t know if the midnight launch was some strategic move to force the Prime Minister’s hand to call the election – there had been rumours that Lawrence Gonzi was going to convene Parliament to discuss an impeachment motion.

If not done for strategic reasons, the midnight bash qualifies as one of those irritating electoral gimmicks which politicians would be better off without.

The thing about these absurd gimmicks is that they’re so try-hard. Politicians who resort to these stunts come across as being desperate to impress as being cool and with-it. Unfortunately going overboard to try and impress has the reverse effect and people just conclude that you’re pathetic.

Hopefully, all press conferences in future will be held during normal business hours, especially if they’re held for singularly unmomentous events such as the unveiling of a billboard.

• Labour revealed their energy proposals on Monday. Konrad Mizzi had hardly finished his presentation about the topic before the PN had taken to the airwaves, pooh-poohing the proposals and dismissing them out of hand. Tonio Fenech was especially insufferable on one of the several programmes he appeared on. (What’s with seeing Fenech everywhere? It’s getting to the point where you expect him to pop out from under the bed, ranting on about gas-laden ships).

Fenech was banging on about Labour’s energy proposal being only a desk-top study. “Desk-top study,” he repeated, pausing ominously between each word and imbuing every syllable with as much contempt as he could mus­ter. The gist of his intervention was that the Labour proposal was based on unscientific studies, would turn out to be more expensive than envisaged and would take much longer to be completed. According to Fenech the Labour proposals were so much pie-in-the-sky.

Without going into the specifics about the Labour plan, it’s a bit rich for Nationalist ministers to accuse anybody else of dreaming up hare-brained schemes which never get off the ground. A quick run-through of some of the Nationalist Party’s grand pre-election promises will serve to show why the PN should have the good grace to realise that Labour-bashing on this point just makes people think of pots and kettles.

Remember the Smart Island campaign? The one which was heralded with much fanfare and posters of local celebrities enthusing about the benefits of this great technological leap forward?

Apart from a fancy online portal, a basic level familiarisation course about computers (‘This is the on/off switch. This is a mouse’) and a poster blitz, the Smart Island concept has disappeared without a trace.

The several thousand jobs which were supposed to transform Smart City into a thriving hub have never materialised. That’s hot air for you.

In the same vein, whatever happened to the €200 million White Rocks sports city project? The advertising arm of Where’s Everybody? was assigned the public relations for the project, we had a couple of endorsements by leading sports personalities, and then the whole project just wasn’t mentioned any more. Weren’t any serious studies carried out before these projects were announced to the assembled masses (and before we sunk thousands of euros on publicity campaigns?).

As for projects taking far longer than envisaged, maybe Fenech should toddle over to the Cottonera Waterfront and see the shambles that passes off for works-in-progress. Then again, perhaps Fenech doesn’t bother much with the Gozo ferry, seeing his preferred mode of transport seems to be a private jet, but the works on the Ċirkewwa terminal dragged on for ages. And they went over-budget, just as practically every government project has.

Also, if we’re talking about long-overdue decisions and projects, if the PN intended to switch to a gas-fuelled power plant, why did it plump for one that runs on heavy fuel oil and fiddle around with the maximum emission levels permissible to accommodate the introduction of such a plant?

If the PN is going to stage some form of attack on Labour’s credibility, it’s going to have to do much better than this. Insofar as the energy issue goes, the PN’s credibility lies in tatters.

cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt

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