Those who follow the Prime Minister’s ventures know he is not one for improvising. He plans and acts, even speaks, according to a pre-determined script. At times, however, life – especially within the political arena – has a habit of forcing a twist in the tale. This is exactly what happened to our Prime Minister last weekend.
His plan was to have a series of positive public relation events centreing on the celebration of Freedom Day, the appointment of a new President and a smooth Cabinet reshuffle. That was the plan until a Cabinet minister decided to remove the rug from underneath the Prime Minister’s feet. Godfrey Farrugia, apparently unhappy with the treatment he was getting, decided to write and execute a script of his own.
The Prime Minister, as a result of Farrugia’s pre-emptive resignation, had to revisit his Cabinet Version 2 formation. He hastily conveyed his front and backbenchers to the Inquisitor’s Palace and set about forming a new Cabinet line-up. In a desperate bid to shift the focus away from the overtones and undertones of Farrugia’s resignation, Muscat announced his intention to nominate Karmenu Vella as Malta’s next European Commissioner.
Four people left the front bench – four backbenchers were brought in to replace them. This is the first shortcoming of last weekend’s tribulations. The Prime Minister had an opportunity to reduce the oversized Cabinet which is clearly not functioning. He had an opportunity to reduce the cost of governing but chose the good of the party over the good of the nation and kept the largest Cabinet since Independence. The latest statistics from the National Statistics Office show a €41 million rise in the cost of government. This is not sustainable.
The second mistake was to combine the health and energy portfolios. This goes against a clear commitment of the Labour Party before the election. It also defies logic. The two sectors are unrelated, highly demanding and come with their respective complex set of problems. The Prime Minister, with this highly controversial move, has rendered himself responsible for any shortcoming in the health sector.
He will also be the most likely target if the power station project falls behind schedule. It is clear that this ministry is going to be a nightmare to administer. The challenges that the health sector faces go beyond the administrative, especially if this government insists in increasing public expenditure by bloating further public sector employment.
My fear is that we are going to see deterioration in fulfilling our EU obligations and in making best use of funding opportunities in the health and energy sectors. Ministers and parliamentary secretaries taking on new responsibilities inevitably go through a learning curve, which means policy direction will be slow in coming. The long and short of it is that a year after the election we are going to go through another hiatus with initiatives at a standstill awaiting ministerial direction.
The Prime Minister also erred when he failed to carry out any consultations before putting forward Vella’s name as our next European Commissioner. Time was certainly not an issue, given that Tonio Borg’s appointment does not lapse before October. The Prime Minister is assuming that the European Commission, the Opposition and everyone else is happy to play along with his plans without having been remotely engaged or consulted.
The health and energy sectors are unrelated, highly demanding and come with their respective complex set of problems
In nominations such as this, the country deserves to have a common voice, a united front. But the first step to achieving this common front has to come from the government. This has not happened either in the nomination of the President or in the nomination of the next European Commissioner.
The Opposition has nevertheless supported Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca’s nomination as our next President. It was indeed the first time an Opposition has voted in favour of a nominee coming from the government political spectrum. We did so as a sign of overture despite the stifling political atmosphere the country is engulfed in. We did so despite our reservations over the government’s apparent plans to diversify the role of the President, again without any form of engagement or consultation.
By giving the President a quasi, if not full executive role, this government risks reducing the moral authority of the President. Past presidents have done our country proud, each carving their own individual mark on the presidency within the rights and obligations set out in our Constitution. I am more than sure that Coleiro Preca can do the same without the changes being contemplated by the government.
If any different or new functions are to be assigned to the President, this should only be done after a proper, transparent and national debate has taken place in which a consensus has been reached. Failure to do so will simply be tantamount to an affront to the unanimous vote taken on Tuesday in Parliament, when appointing Coleiro Preca as our President.
This government, thanks to the majority it enjoys, had a golden opportunity to deliver a new style of doing politics in Malta. It has clearly failed to deliver, as evidenced by the events of last weekend. An ex-minister and a government backbencher have publicly highlighted the Prime Minister’s failings in this regard.
My fear is that with the reactive moves we saw over the weekend, the Prime Minister is going to find it even harder to deliver on his goals, not least on his goal of being a Prime Minister for a united nation.
Mario de Marco is the deputy leader for parliamentary affairs of the Nationalist Party.