I must confess that I am perplexed at how many people think in the short term, so much so that I am seriously wondering whether all this gobbledygook about the world ending on my 56th birthday is having a deleterious psychological effect on us Maltese.

Why doesn’t (Franco) Debono make life simpler and just cross the floor?- Kenneth Zammit Tabona

Far from discussing endings I would prefer to discuss beginnings and boy oh boy did we start the New Year with a bang and a half with a double tragedy in which a young father of two was attacked with a carving knife in the early hours of New Year’s Day. It did not happen in the street, not in Paceville but in the sanctity of his bedroom, in front of his wife, by a man who had walked the rooftops to get into a penthouse in the heart of Sliema for reasons that are and will, forever remain a mystery.

The attacker and the victim both died in pools of blood leaving a trail of tragic misery that over time will merely exacerbate unless resolved.

While a tabloid-like orgy ensued, with next of kin, ill-advisedly, in my opinion, making statements to the nation, another drama was unfolding in our Parliament.

There, our favourite maverick MP, Franco Debono, ended up by unmasking his overriding ambition by slamming the Prime Minister for having had the temerity to not only take his, Dr Debono’s, advice about splitting Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici’s dual ministry but also taking the opportunity of shifting ministerial roles to make greater sense without giving Dr Debono one iota of responsibility. In fact not taking him into consideration at all and vesting his, the Prime Minister’s, trust in gentlemen of tried and tested loyalty and tried and tested expertise.

As we all know, within minutes, Dr Debono launched a diatribe about kings and oligarchies against the Prime Minister, demanding Lawrence Gonzi’s resignation and declaring that, should push come to shove, he would vote with the opposition in a confidence vote.

Why doesn’t Dr Debono make life simpler and just cross the floor?

By the time this article appears I do sincerely hope that Dr Debono will have rued his peevish knee-jerk reaction but I doubt it. I also doubt whether he realised that showing the media a copy of his 1987 Form IIc college report with its “excellent” and “promising” remarks is no way to convince the electorate or the Prime Minister, for that matter, that he should, after the way he has been carrying on, have a ministry.

The Prime Minister could not do otherwise. By giving Dr Debono a ministry he would have appeared to be succumbing to his threats. Dr Gonzi is painfully placed between a jagged rock and a very hard place for, after last Friday’s showdown, it is impossible to treat Dr Debono as if he does not exist anymore.

I have often said that being Prime Minister with a one-seat majority must be a nightmare, a poisoned chalice that complicates life and exasperates the psyche.

To have an MP like Dr Debono to contend with must be like trying to control a classroom with one boy being particularly and persistently obnoxious and the teacher being unable to either whack him on his sit-upon because of these idiotic disciplinary hang-ups or send him out of class. The poor teacher must simply grin and bear it and continue the lesson as best he can. Dr Gonzi is doing the same. Not a role to be envied.

Meanwhile, I will caution the opposition about making too much of a meal of this. If and when an election is called I would expect the Labour Party to win on the strength and conviction of its electoral manifesto and the soundness of its plans for us and not because some over-ambitious backbencher in government practically crossed the floor!

In fact, I am convinced that should Dr Gonzi call a snap election and not allow Dr Debono to contest, he may well lead the Nationalist Party to victory yet again.

As I have always maintained, rocking the boat may be a good thing at times to keep people on their toes but nobody would like it if a fellow passenger in this same boat threatened to capsize it, which is what Dr Debono is doing.

I will be the first to admit that this legislature has been fraught. The divorce issue, for instance, which even obliterated the very serious consequences of the Arab Spring, was so badly handled by the government, both at national and at party level, that it has coloured everything else. Even all the good things that the Gonzi Administration has done to keep us afloat in very uncertain financial times.

I was, however, very taken aback when Dr Debono publicly accused the Prime Minister of mishandling the divorce issue and its aftermath only last Friday.

As far as I know there had never been a squeak about the divorce issue from Dr Debono before other than toeing the party line.

Then, of course, there was the party financing issue where the report prepared by President Emeritus Ugo Mifsud Bonnici was presented to Greco instead of Dr Debono’s!

I can understand how, following that snub, Friday’ snap Cabinet reshuffle was like waving a red rag at a bull.

What I predicted last autumn, when Dr Debono wanted the Prime Minister to force Minister Austin Gatt to resign over the Arriva fiasco, has come to pass. The writing was on the wall since then and it was only a matter of time before in true Violet Bott fashion Dr Debono’s shenanigans started to take their toll on the effectiveness of the legislature, forcing Dr Gonzi to call an early election or, alternatively, make him, Dr Debono, Deputy Prime Minister! Neither of which is in the best interest of the country.