The Nationalist Party leadership contest has turned into a modern day Armageddon amplified by the social media. The backstabbing, intrigue, back room dealings and warring factions have been hard at it, revealing the party as a hotbed of hate, rather than an alternative government. At the time of writing, it is not yet known who are the two or three leadership contenders who’ve made it to the next round. The electorate is watching events unfold with the grim fascination usually reserved for reality shows where contestants are eliminated in different episodes.
Whoever lifts the poisoned chalice of the leadership position is going to face a monumental task in containing the internal party rifts. These are the rifts that have turned into quasi insuperable chasms – with the party machinery/establishment on the one side and the former party faithful on the other. Each and every one of the leadership contenders have trotted off the usual spiel about “reconnecting with the people” – as if the ‘people’ are hanging about waiting for their phone to ring and engage with random politicians.
Alex Perici Calascione said the Nationalist Party should be the party of the people (as opposed to the party of robots or aliens?) and be close to them. Chris Said stated he would set up shop in different localities every week in this reconnection effort. Adrian Delia said party volunteers who deliver funds collected from selling raffle tickets will be greeted with open arms, not simply asked to leave them at the reception desk. Frank Portelli said politicians should be concerned about people’s worries and quotes Lionel Messi saying: “I can’t score if you don’t pass the ball.”
I don’t know if any of the above is going to strike a chord with the ‘people’. Having to be ‘close’ to a political party? What does that mean in real terms? Being waylaid by politicians every time you walk down the road? Feeling happy that you were acknowledged at the Stamperija’s reception desk? How is that going to win over hearts and minds and make people feel passionate about a party whose main exponents are fighting like ferrets in a sack? And isn’t this talk about an outreach programme hopelessly old fashioned?
Politicians are over-promising and under-delivering but doing quite the opposite for themselves
It’s not as if ‘the people’ are floating around in some universe waiting to be plucked to the Nationalist Party bosom by the new leader. It just doesn’t work that way. Potential voters, party members and supporters are not fruit waiting to be picked by politicians. Political loyalty is not earned by the simple expedient of a chat with the new leader when he rolls into town, apologising for unspecified “weggħat” (wounds) inflicted by his predecessors.
There’s far more to it than that. Let’s start by dispelling some tropes about ‘the people’. The people are not a captive audience who live in suspense waiting for politicians to connect to them. In fact, most people live busy, productive lives quite oblivious to politicians’ press releases or meet and greets at the local każin. They are quite happy to continue in this vein – mostly because they have quite a lot on their plate with the daily challenges of family life, work and just getting around from one place to another.
So if the next PN leader wants to make any headway with this reconnection project – he’s going to have to do all the running by himself – in subtle, non-invasive ways. There is no way people are going to take time out of their busy schedule to hear a politician drone away from a podium. Those days are over. Any attempt to understand voters has to be undertaken by an intelligent study and analysis of their lives – as reflected on social media and as seen in everyday situations. Trying to corral an audience to party events just won’t cut it. As for the much-lauded home visits – they would be a useful tool if only they were backed up by action following the small talk.
Which brings us to the other main reason for political disenchantment – the sense that politicians are over-promising and under-delivering for the party footsoldiers but doing quite the opposite for themselves. This came to the fore in a Facebook video posted by a PN activist and volunteer who railed at the way he had been disenfranchised in the first round of the leadership race because of some bureaucratic oversight.
It wasn’t just this that hurt him – it was the sense of not even being considered as a person whose opinion was valuable. He had volunteered hundreds of man hours for free for the political party he supported and yet he was not appreciated or even acknowledged. He had given up precious free time and energy in the service of the party for free and he was brushed off as a number. Others higher up in the party hierarchy had guzzled away tens of thousands of euros in salaries and left nothing to show for it. That rankled and still does.
As sociologist Alan Wolfe puts it, “people adhere to social contracts” – and they participate in political projects – “when they feel that what lies behind them is a credible story of who they are and why their fates are linked to those of others”. The next PN leader is going to have to find a way of creating that sense of common purpose, otherwise the party is condemning itself to more years in the political wilderness.
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