The death of Dom Mintoff should be an opportunity for the country to address, analyse and reflect on his political record and try to reconcile the sad events that scarred Malta’s post-war history.
The unqualified praise of Mintoff’s political legacy weakened the respect we all should have for the truth- Klaus Vella Bardon
As a prominent political person and a previous Prime Minister, and in memory of the ideals that drove this overpowering personality, it was right and fitting that he was given a State funeral and the dignified farewell we owe to the dead.
Unfortunately, there were times when what should have been a sombre and dignified event was reduced to an unabashed exercise in partisan propaganda. Also, the unqualified praise of his political legacy, especially from certain quarters, weakened the respect we all should have for the truth. Despite the good intentions to heal past hurts, one should question whether this is a fair or even an effective approach.
As Desmond Tutu, the protagonist of reconciliation in South Africa said in 2004: “We don’t possess a fiat by which we can declare ‘let bygones be bygones’ and they dutifully become bygones and go and lie down quietly. They have an uncanny capacity to return and haunt us.
“An unexamined and unacknowledged past finds all kinds of skeletons emerging from all sorts of cupboards to bedevil the present.”
Is reconciliation being served when we airbrush away the negative aspects of Mintoff’s political career that caused so much pain, bitterness and bad feelings? It is true that in any conflict, political, familial or otherwise, the issues of right and wrong get blurred and often misrepresented. Yet, is terming Mintoff’s methods debatable a fair representation of what took place under his watch?
The confrontations between the Church and Mintoff in the 1960s and the impact of his high-handed style of government have left deep-seated scars in our society.
Particularly, as regards the conflict with the Church, one feels that those events have not received the scholarly and dispassionate analysis they deserve taking into account the social and historical context of the time.
On various occasions, the Church has tried to reconcile itself with the Labour Party. It must be remembered that efforts to heal the deep wounds between the Church and the Labour Party had already been started in the late 1960s between Archbishop Michael Gonzi and Mintoff.
In the pastoral letter of Lent 1988, our bishops again extended a hand of friendship and reconciliation, asking forgiveness for any actions of the Church that antagonised those who felt hurt on account of their political convictions, irrespective of whether these feelings were justified or not. On the Feast of Christ the King in 1989, the bishops again referred to the rift in society and appealed for forgiveness and reconciliation.
Yet numerous comments in the public arena raise serious doubts as to whether this was achieved. Allowing public opinion to portray the Church totally in the wrong and the Labour Party as the innocent victim in the sad events of that era is a travesty of justice. Making blanket apologies have proved again and again not to be the tools of authentic reconciliation.
Also, matters have not been helped by the failure of Labour Party officials to reciprocate sincerely and react more positively to such appeals.
If we really respect each other, we should all try, as objectively and civilly as possible, to examine Mintoff’s eventful public career and try to seek the truth with courage and fairness.
More importantly, we must all try to see and understand the mindset, emotions, feelings and experiences of all who suffered through that turbulent era – on both sides.
Healing the past will not be achieved by amnesia or collective forgetfulness. It will neither be served by people nursing their hurts and staying in their victimhood that prevents them from seeing the pain of the ‘other’ and recognising the direct or indirect responsibility of themselves and ‘their party’ or social group in the way our recent history unfolded.
It is long overdue that a serious attempt is made by all sides to reconcile this chapter of our history and turn a new leaf in the attitude we have towards each other in the inevitable clash of ideas that are integral to any nation’s development.
The onus of this neglected yet salutary exercise is directly proportional to the level of responsibility we all carry in our community.