I followed the Scottish referendum on independence with more than a modicum of interest. While appreciating the worries of many over possible price fluctuations of their favourite single malts (!), I was curious to see how the people of Scotland would react to a campaign on voting Yes for independence from the UK. This at a time when Malta was celebrating its very own 50 years of self-government.
The result left me in no doubt of what I have suspected all along. As the Italians well coin it, tutto ’l mondo e un paese, and it is becoming increasingly obvious that an electorate’s mindset is universal irrespective of its nationality. The age of inflexibility in voting is long past as voters increasingly opt to cast their ballot according to issues rather than parties.
In Malta this function saw its germination quite a few years back but was possibly clearly evident for the first time with the proposal for Malta to join the EU.
During this referendum – and thanks to many, but not least Simon Busuttil’s stupendous efforts – the country conceived the concept that it is possible for people to vote on issues and not necessarily along party lines. For the first time in Malta we witnessed voters from across the political spectrum coming together to vote on a single common issue: EU membership.
The trend continued with other local controversies such as the introduction of divorce and same-sex marriage, where voters and opinion makers displayed great enthusiasm for and against irrespective of their party’s stand.
The take-home message for the political parties was clear. Voters are moving away from myopic, inflexible choices and prefer to make their prized electoral choice on issues which may concern them directly or indirectly.
This was a wake-up call for political parties to strive even harder to garner brownie points with a demanding and sometimes unforgiving electorate.
In the past year the Maltese electorate stood witness as another issue took precedence over partisan politics. The government’s decision to sell Maltese citizenship was met with a collective outcry as we struggled with the implications of a botched-up scheme that could attract dubious individuals seeking EU citizenship through our own front door. The government had no electoral mandate for this unorthodox method of attracting ‘talent.’
In this case the electorate was not asked for its opinion and the government must have assumed that the victory at the polls meant there was a consensus to bulldozer on.
Coming up next is the referendum on spring hunting due to coincide, hopefully, with the March local council elections in 2015. The Prime Minister’s pre-electoral promises have come back to haunt him. His decision to close the autumn hunting season prior to the grilling of EU commissioner designate Karmenu Vella left us all in no doubt whatsoever as to his real motives.
The reaction from the hunters was predictable to say the least, but of course entirely indefensible in the eyes of the rest of the nation.
Here is another ‘issue’ which should rise way above party politics and which should be sorted out with a people’s mandate once and for all. Clearly Muscat’s approach to environmental issues like hunting and the ODZ schemes rest on abject contradictions.
Will the local council elections be held in March? Or will the Maltese and Gozitan electorate be deprived of an opportunity to choose local councillors simply to avoid a scalping on ‘another issue’? I wonder whether the electorate will feel that the issue of spring hunting is yet another one clamouring for national unity that will thrust them towards the polls with or without the local council elections.
Issues, not parties, are the driving force behind electorates today. Muscat was fully aware of this during the run-up to the 2013 general election. Hollow promises were bandied about gleefully and it is now time to pay the piper.
Where issues are concerned people expect strong leadership and crystal clear recommendations with no retreat. Voters are concerned about issues and expect them to be energetically taken on by political parties who are representing them.
Labour in government must accept that running a country requires taking tough, responsible and mature decisions away from partisanship and electoral convenience. Sadly we have seen little of the former and a lot of the latter.
info@carolinegalea.com
Caroline Galea is a member of the Nationalist Party’s executive committee.