IT'S THEIR CALL

The story that no-one much contested the elections to administrative posts within the Labour Party raised quite few comments, hardly surprisingly. I've no doubt the lads and ladettes on the PN side of the media equation had quite a few laughs and published quite a few snide remarks of their own, the political scene having been set by Labour's own gleeful stories, over the years, about the trials and tribulations of the PN's inner workings.

Truth be told, I've always been mildly bemused by this fascination the two parties have with the problems that beset each other's intestinal tracts. As soon as rumours of stories about conjecture about kites flown about the possibility of, say, the PN's Officer-in-charge of Paper Clips in the Secretary-General's Assistant's Secretary's office being less than fully gruntled with his lot, you get that peculiar rag, Kull Hadd publishing a story about how the PN was going to disappear up its own fundament.

Equally comically, as soon as the possibility of a story about a rumour about a whisper that Joseph Muscat's third assistant under-driver's fourth replacement being moderately annoyed that he has been replaced in the glow of the master's favour, Il-Mument gives the thing front page prominence, for all the world as if the end of Labour's world was nigh.

In fact, how each party constitutes and runs itself is pretty much its own business, said business being conducted by the die-hards and worthies, usually men of a certain age, who have beavered away from the year dot to rise up the ranks to become counsellors or whatever they're called.

Both parties have within their frameworks areas that cater for youths and for women and for - for all I know - cross-dressing transvestites of indeterminate gender, but from the outside looking in, as I am (which might be hard to believe for those who think I'm right on the inside of the PN, which could hardly be further from the truth) the vista is uncompromisingly of grey men in grey suits proposing grey policies.

So in this regard, Joseph Muscat is a bit of a relief, given that he's not given to sporting grey suits and what's left of his hair (I'm a fine one to speak) is not yet grey. Give it a few more months of coping with Toni Abela and Anglu Farrugia and it will be, I suspect, but that's a whole ‘nother story.

Thus, which is an alternative to "so" in this context, when the commentariat starts spouting about how the Labour Party hasn't changed and what clearer evidence could you wish for in the light of the way nothing has changed at the top of the party, I wonder whether this is really anyone's business but Labour's.

I mean to say, if they really want to have an International Secretary whose claim to fame is the fact that he looks bonny in a sailor hat and was opposed to Malta's joining the EU, then who are we to gainsay them? So what if the party President, the extremely affable Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi, is the same guy who has been in place for quite a few years? Frankly, I could think of quite a few potential candidates who would be a much worse president, and believe me, that's not much of a compliment to SZA.

The bottom line is, I and you and anyone who isn't a fully paid-up member of the jolly old Labour Party hasn't the right to criticise their choice of leaders. Nor are we entitled to comment on what can only be described as the rather perplexing decision to ditch the post of General Secretary, occupied with such distinction by Jason Micallef, whose aversion to writing about food is only one of his many fine qualities.

It's Labour's call, not ours, and if they choose to give the impression that always these changes but always the same thing (toujours ca change and all that, my French stinks) then, hey, who are we to comment?

Why change a winning team, hey?