When Joseph Muscat officially kicked off his election campaign at 12:01am on a freezing Monday morning in Ħamrun on January 7, 2013, he promised radical change which the public would need adjusting to. Malta would be revolutionised, Muscat insisted, and “would be taken away from the clique and given back to the people, irrespective of how they vote”.

Now 25 months later (replace ‘months’ with ‘days’ if desirous) there is not a single person left on this little island that can keep a straight face while repeating those words. A landslide victory that brought relief to so many Labourites has been replaced by a landslide feeling of delusion.

While it has to be said that people instantly pointed out that the fear of greed and utter mismanagement could become the order of the day as a result of such a resounding win, no one really expected it to happen so fast and so furiously.

The painful part is that the warnings were there. In May 2012, then-Labour MP Adrian Vassallo had indicated that Labour had “no plan” for governing and that the golden rule at Mile End revolved around a plain “win now, plan later” approach.

People mocked Vassallo for his claims and cited bad blood that had already started to become visible within the party structure, but deep down everyone feared that this could and would be true. The results or lack thereof over the past couple of years have vindicated the forced-out Labour veteran.

Weeks into the current legislature, it became very evident that the only plan in motion was to take over every conceivable position and role in sight – and beyond. You name it, Labour went for it. The Super One newsroom was transferred en masse over to the national broadcasting office, people who in any way or form assisted the Labour Party throughout its election campaign where rewarded like there was no tomorrow – making hay while the sun shines, someone recently called it – and in the process the most inapt people were placed in areas most essential to governing.

Weeks into the current legislature, it became very evident that the only plan in motion was to take over every conceivable position and role in sight

However, the belief that all this is possible with no consequences whatsoever is tragic and beggars belief. The people who took pride in turning a former journalist and MEP into a Prime Minister have evidently skipped town, leaving Labour to lead in a bizarre management-by-crisis approach. And even then, they have failed at it.

A power station that promised to make Malta the next best thing after sliced bread never materialised, good governance and transparency have become increasingly suspect, the environment has been relegated to a newly-created division, and the police force and judiciary, which took years and years of rebuilding after the bloody eighties, have been degenerated.

This latter point is of great concern, as a modern European nation that prides itself on its progress does not have its police commissioner fired three times in one legislature, have its Home Affairs Minister resign in disgrace and have its Justice Minister breach the Constitution in the process of conjuring judicial appointments.

In every infrastructure, there is a limit to wrong doing and errors that can be permitted before the situation becomes a critical one – if in doubt, just ask Greece. The situation in Malta has reached breaking point, whether we admit it or not.

A nation is not solely judged by its surviving economy – it is also judged by the results it obtains or fails to obtain in social development, opportunities, environmental sustainability, foreign relations and simple good governance. This government has shownlittle to no regard to most of these points, and is stuck in a rut which it will come to regret in the not so distant future.

Politics in Malta needs a revamp. Making hay while the sun shines is unfortunately an over-used mentality well past its sell date, and the good news is that the ever-growing Simon Busuttil as leader of the Opposition has single-handedly dedicated himself to doing away with this at all costs.

A lot depends on the trust that citizens have in their leaders and the respect and dignity such political figures should have, and the repercussions of such will be felt regardless of how deep we stick our heads in the sand. Now is the time to address today’s and tomorrow’s problems before it becomes yet another negative anecdote in our history. Now is the time to wake up and smell the coffee.

Nicky Azzopardi is a lawyer and vice president of the Nationalist Party’s youth movement.