The electoral campaign has clearly illustrated the radical difference in the way the Nationalist Party and the Labour Party conceptualise politics.
The PL’s campaign has reignited the cry of ‘entitlement’ by rank and file. Malta tagħna lkoll – Malta is ours. The sole focus of the campaign was twofold: give the impression that Malta currently belongs to a few people and drive a popular ‘group envy’ to claim an entitlement on what is portrayed as belonging to someone else.
At no point have we heard any mention of people’s responsibilities towards each other, towards society and towards the country.
Lawrence Gonzi has a radically different vision of politics and society. His vision is one of politics with a purpose, politics as the collective human endeavour to recreate society into one where everyone belongs. It is a vision of responsible politics and rights born out of the responsibilities we share towards each others.
In Gonzi’s vision of politics, we are ‘makers’ not ‘takers’, the makers of the society we want to live in. Malta is being created by the day-to-day pains, struggles, work, creativity, ingenuity, of us all. There is a profound understanding that Malta is what we make of it.
On the one hand, Joseph Muscat promotes the politics of entitlement. Gonzi promotes the politics of responsibility.
In his book Bring Home the Revolution, Jonathan Freedland articulated in one sentence the challenge that the PN had to struggle with after the end of the Mintoffian era in 1987:
“The more we rely on ourselves, the smaller our need for the State; the smaller the State, the more we will learn to work together.”
Twenty-five years after what we all considered to be the end of the era in which the State controlled everything, the PN continues to struggle against the bureaucracies of a State that tend to want to continuously increase their sphere of control over every aspect of our lives. Take Mepa, for example. The PN’s electoral proposal to restrict Mepa’s jurisdiction to the outside aesthetics of a building is definitely a step in the right direction. But it is also a symbolic example of the quality leap we should aim for our politics.
This Saturday, we will vote on what we can achieve together but which none of us can achieve alone. The ‘takers’ will expect someone else to do it for them, while waiting for what can be claimed as tagħna wkoll. The ‘makers’, however, will focus on their individual and collective responsibility in securing a stronger future for all.
Gonzi’s vision of politics challenges us to help plan and build, invest our time and energy, ingenuity and creativity, in meeting the challenge to continue growing stronger together, recreating a Malta where everyone belongs as a direct outcome of one’s contribution and responsibilities towards society.
Gonzi invites all ‘makers’ to prevent their future being determined by the ‘takers’ ready to claim that all of Malta belongs to them rather than working for a Malta where everyone belongs.
(The author is a Nationalist Party electoral candidate.)