We had not had a proper conversation for over 20 years. In fact, with the exception of a couple of e-mails over the past two years and a brief airport encounter in Rome about seven years ago, we never communicated. Clearly, we must have not felt any strong enough need to do so.
The relationship between the PN and Nationalists cannot be hurriedly repaired- Mario Vella
It happens, you will say. We meet and get to know many people in our lives but keep uninterruptedly in touch with only relatively few. C’est la vie, the world weary fatalists among you will mutter, knowingly nodding their head. Those into latter day heavy metal will recall the callous lyrics of Under and Over It (Five Finger Death Punch, 2011) and they too will nod in approval.
But fatalism and callousness are eminently conservative qualities. The fatalist and the callous pretend to be above it all, to have seen it all. They claim immunity from enthusiasm for the new and from hope in a better tomorrow. Their philosophy is terminally bleak. They insist that the world was, is and always will always be crap, whatever you may say and whatever you may do.
They feign disdain for the Establishment but, in fact, they are the Establishment’s best friends and protectors. By belittling the enthusiasm of those that refuse to bow their heads to the powerful, they assist the powerful. They feign proud independence from those in power but, in fact, theirs is the most abject servility to power.
That is why reconnecting with this old friend has made my year. Twenty-twelve would have been a poorer year for me if we had not met and spoken and resolved to continue our conversation. And, let’s face it, it has not been a bad year only for Lawrence Gonzi and his party/government – the two have become practically indistinguishable – but for all of us in this battered country. Truly an annus horribilis.
Ironically, the more strenuous the efforts of those at the helm of Gonzi’s party to look for worse situations in Malta’s past, the more transparent becomes their desperate attempt to deviate attention from the seriousness of the present situation. That is not to say that our political history has been free of extremely difficult situations. It has not. And, given the circumstances, it could not have been otherwise.
Fortunately, many – I think most – Nationalists today are way ahead of Gonzi and his party/government in the soberness of their assessment of the situation.
I do not believe that Gonzi, his advisers, his Cabinet, his MPs and their canvassers, the Nationalist Party’s council and the party machine truly represent today the majority of the Maltese that identify themselves with the PN of Fortunato and Enrico Mizzi, of George Borg Olivier and Eddie Fenech Adami.
The passing away of Guido de Marco, on the one hand, and, on the other, the passing away of Fr Peter Serracino Inglott and the emargination of Louis Galea – two key figures in the reconstruction and modernisation of the PN after Borg Olivier – have contributed significantly to the estrangement of the party from thinking Nationalists.
The relationship between the PN and Nationalists cannot be hurriedly repaired. It cannot, for example, be stitched together again by Mario de Marco’s attempts to be hip and cool with the liberals within his party by promoting legislative changes in theatre censorship. Unless such changes in legislation reflect a serious and open discussion within the PN – not only among its general councillors but throughout the party and beyond it – then these moves can only lead to a widening of the rift.
The more conservative supporters will accuse their MPs of buckling under the pressure of liberals. As veteran Giov De Martino commented online to a report on this newspaper recently: “I very much regret that it had to be the PN to sow so many winds.”
In fact, just how disconnected the Minister for Tourism, Culture and the Environment himself is from the determination and the aspirations of Maltese artists, writers and creative operators generally is demonstrated by his recent infelicitous statement to the effect that being an artist is never viable. That he chose the occasion of the declaration of Valletta’s winning of the “unanimous” bid to be European Capital for Culture for 2018 to say so was even more infelicitous.
Does he not talk to the many Maltese that are seriously committed to professionalism in literature and the arts?
This brings me back to my old friend and to what will, I am sure, be a fruitful and enduring conversation about where we have come from, where we are and where we might go.
I am certain that the Minister of Culture would do well to talk to people like my friend. A writer, certainly one of this country’s eminent men and women of culture, and an intellectual who has been close to the PN from well before it came to power in 1987, my friend is a precious asset for the whole country who should be listened to by those who distance themselves from the real country with every word they say.
It is not coyness that led me not to mention this person’s name today. I have chosen to do so because, reflecting on who my friend might be, will lead you to think of the many that fit the description.
The author blogs at http://watersbroken.wordpress.com .