The local council elections have passed, with the results and numbers being what they are. However, what is important to notice is the message that the electorate conveyed. The Labour Party won by a large national majority of votes, leaving GonziPN trailing behind.

This is what we see at first glance. But most importantly, the analysis of the results should be taken locality by locality. It is a futile exercise trying to play with numbers as if this were a national election because local council elections and the analysis of the subsequent election results should be focused on the locality; the message sent through the election in each village, town, or city.

This is not a survey or any other exercise to see how the party in government is faring but rather how the local councils fared in their past tenure. It is disrespectful, to say the least, if GonziPN tries to play with numbers as if this were just another expensive survey to see whether the population is happy with its performance in government.

Analysis should be broken down locality by locality with the failures and achievements of each local council being shown through the ballot paper on March 10. If the electorate had been happy with its local council’s performance, the choice was easy, that of voting again for the same council. If the electorate was not happy, it had other candidates to vote for, or as some have done, abstain from voting. The results were clear: some councils remained fairly unchanged, others registered some changes and others changed drastically. But in no way should these results be analysed from a general election perspective.

Each and every locality’s electoral result should be respected as it is.

Moreover, it is useless to compare these results with the previous local council eletions, as the majority of the past local council elections coincided with either the general election or with the European Parliament elections.

Another interesting analysis that GonziPN fails to see is the success of younger candidates in these past elections. Such a result shows that the electorate is ready to trust these candidates who bring a lot of different positive elements to the table.

It is also worrying to listen to claims such as Lawrence Gonzi’s call for his party to try and listen more to the people’s call, that of entering their homes and becoming closer to the public. This was a local council election and not a means to try and remain in power by all means necessary. Dr Gonzi’s promise of getting closer to the people has been stated and forgotten countless times during the last four years of his party’s term in government. GonziPN has had all the time in the world to try and get closer to the people, and not just before the council elections.

It is easy to see that time is ticking fast at the Dar Ċentrali.