As time goes by, more often than before, I’m being told of perverse stories where people are afraid of talking, fearing retribution by the government or its allies. Stories that make you wonder and make you think of what this country is becoming.

I’m going to recount a personal story I heard from one of my constituents in the ninth district. The sad thing is that this isn’t a one-off story as it is something I hear about almost every week.

I was doing my usual round of house visits in Msida. It was almost 9pm and already the day’s events were taking their toll. I was feeling rather tired, but I only had one block of flats left to finish the street, so I braced myself and rang the bell of one of the apartments.

I thought the lady on the other side of the door was actually waiting for the doorbell to ring as she immediately opened and two minutes later I was in her living room, sitting comfortably and sipping a warm cup of coffee.

After the initial niceties and introductions, which niceties lately always include a 10-minute discussion about my recent wedding, I asked her a simple question. “How comfortably are you managing to live lately?”

It’s something of a strange question to ask, however I got into the habit of asking an open-ended question when visiting people, as it makes it easier for them to open up and talk about themselves.

After all I don’t want to bore people to death talking about myself. I’d rather let them do the talking. It’s definitely more interesting and after all it’s what people actually want to do.

Malta is currently managed by a few people that are only interested in themselves and that will try their utmost best to keep everyone quiet by giving them the bare minimum

To this question this woman opened up her life story. She told me she lives alone as her husband had passed away a few years ago and her two sons are now adults and both have their own families.

She told me that up until 1996 she had always voted Labour. However she and her late husband decided to trust the PN in 1998 and had voted PN till 2008, after which her husband had passed away. At the last election she once again felt that PL was the best option for our country and voted Labour for the first time since 1996.

After that she went back to my original question and told me that overall she believes that she’s living comfortably, comfortable in a way that she makes ends meet.  However, deep down she feels that we’re all living in one big prison where the inmates are kept happy in order to be kept under control.

To this I didn’t know how to react so I asked her to explain herself further.

She went on to say that she feels that the current situation in Malta is a surreal one. She said she felt betrayed by the government she trusted at the last election. It had betrayed the values that she and her husband worked so hard for.

In return, to keep the public quiet, she feels that the government is giving back the bare minimum and in the meantime ensuring that whoever talks against the government will pay dearly. Then she went on to recount what had happened to one of her sons.

Her younger son worked as a self-employed for a private construction company that relied heavily on government contracts. Although self-employed, he worked exclusively for this company.

Lately, her son decided to start hanging out in a Nationalist Party club just because his best friends went there every now and again for a drink. She told me that her son in the last election had voted for the PL as well, so he definitely wasn’t someone obsessed with politics. His only ‘sin’ was to hang out in a PN club once a week.

It happened that one night as soon as he left the PN club he bumped into another colleague of his and without thinking anything of it, he invited him to the club to share a drink before calling it a night. His colleague replied that he would never enter a PN club and he sternly walked away.

Her son thought nothing of this and went home to his family. Then, a few days later, while at work he was called for a meeting by the company’s representative, who told him they were doing some restructuring and they wouldn’t require his services any longer after the current project was finished.

He felt that this was too much of a coincidence and was sure this was ordered directly from high above as a direct retribution because he was seen having a drink at a PN club and his other colleague came to the wrong conclusion.

This lady told me that she is happy that her son has now won some other contracts and he’s actually better off. However, she’s still upset that these things happen in our country.

She went on to explain once again that she is convinced that Malta is currently run by a few people that are only interested in themselves and that will trytheir utmost best to keep everyonequiet by giving them the bare minimum while anyone who doesn’t toe the lineis punished.

After this very interesting discussion we realised that it was already 10.30pm so I bid her farewell and assured her I will never forget that very interesting visit.

It’s time that in this beautiful country of ours we stop those that are trying their best to silence anyone who doesn’t agree with them.

Malta is such a small country, abeautiful country, and we can’t affordto live in a way that we have to becareful where we socialise, or who we support in public, just because we might be reprimanded.

This must stop and in order to stop it we need to ensure that those that are abusing the system are taught a lesson once and for all.

This lesson can and will be taught when the public is asked to give its judgment at the next general election.

Alan Abela-Wadge is president of the Nationalist Party College of Local Councillors and a general election candidate, ninth district.