‘I call them the new switchers’

Michael Falzon
Former Nationalist
Cabinet minister

“Like many, I was not surprised by the fact that Labour won the election, but I must admit the incredibly wide gap between LP and PN surprised me no end.

More than in any other election, social media played a very important part. Social media like Facebook tend to group like-minded persons together, creating a bubble that does not reflect the way the majority is thinking. That is why many were misled into looking forward to a different result.

Many thought the polls could not be telling the truth, considering the ‘feel-good’ factor that was evident in PN activities. However, everybody – including me – seems to have missed an important phenomenon. While a good proportion of 2013 switchers and abstainers returned to the PN fold, there was a shift to Labour from yet another batch of traditional PN voters, who had voted PN in 2013.

I call them the new switchers.

They are self-employed people with small businesses who believed the PN’s scaremongering about the economy in 2013.

They then found that rather than being bailed out, Malta was doing better.

Their own businesses were also doing better, and they were in no mood to upset the applecart. They decided silently to switch. While running after the lost sheep of 2013, the PN did not realise that it was losing another batch of traditional voters in 2017.

Politics is all about the hope of a better life. Morality is all about the hope of a better afterlife

Politics is all about the hope of a better life. Morality is all about the hope of a better afterlife.

As Niccolo Machiavelli told his Prince: “Politics has no relation to morals.”

‘What Simon could have said’

Joe Friggieri
Professor of philosophy, University of Malta

“The big swing to Labour did not happen this time round but in the run-up to the election of 2013, even though the signs of a Nationalist decline had been visible before 2008.

Two things happened in 2013. In the traditionally strong Labour districts taken together (first to seventh), the PL vote rose from 58 per cent to a staggering 63 per cent, while in the other districts, the Nationalists saw their overall majority being drastically reduced.

While these demographic factors explain the almost identical results of the 2013 and 2017 elections in statistical terms, they tell us very little about what motivated the electorate to vote the way they did. One reason for the general decline in PN support over the years could have been the PN’s lack of a political ideal similar to the struggle for Independence prior to 1964 and the enthusiasm generated by the idea of joining the EU 40 years later.

The most common explanation being put forward for last week’s election results is that while those who voted for the PN-PD coalition (roughly 44 per cent) did so for reasons related to good governance, the rest (roughly 55 per cent) voted the way they did because they were reaping the benefits of the government’s successful economic performance.

The explanation may have been couched in different terms, but the idea remains basically the same.

The PN’ was reluctant to dwell on the huge benefits Malta has enjoyed since joining the EU

Now while it seems true that for the majority of the electorate, all the harping on corruption did not produce the desired effect, the PN could have done much more to drive home the truth that if the economy was doing well, this was also due to the important decisions made by the Gonzi administration that enabled Malta to weather the economic and financial storm that was raging at the time across the globe. Had the crisis been handled badly, our economy would have collapsed. Failure to remind people of this was a major flaw in the PN’s electoral campaign.

A second serious shortcoming was the PN’s reluctance to dwell on the huge benefits enjoyed by Malta since it joined the EU, including the vast reserves of structural and development funds made available upon accession and used by the Labour government to finance most of its projects. This failure becomes even more difficult to understand given that Simon Busuttil played such an important role in the pro-EU campaign and dedicated so much of his time and energy in order to make sure that we did not miss the boat – something which we could easily have done.

Whether using these two facts as a major plank in the PN’s electoral campaign would have gained more votes for the party than harping on the corruption issue is hard to tell. But at least one could have tried.”

‘The PN’s war effort was feeble and one-dimensional’

Dominic Fenech
Professor of history, Dean of the Faculty of Arts, University of Malta

“First, on the positive side, there’s of course Labour’s all-too-familiar record of a booming economy, near-full employment, praise from credit-rating agencies, a financial surplus for the first time in many people’s living memory, civil rights, promises of more of everything based on a proven track record.

These things matter. It’s not flawless and has inbuilt fragilities like over-reliance on certain sectors and the risk of environmental degradation, but on the whole, an undeniably glowing reference. Yet here was the PN again, telling voters that Labour was a recipe for economic disaster.

The PN’s own war effort was feeble and one-dimensional. Ever since Gaffarena and Żonqor, and still more since Panama, the PN has wanted to believe it could set the political agenda solely on the narrative of governanza. But that narrative lost momentum and as recently as last March was neutralised by the db Group story (while party ultras bayed for their deputy leader’s blood – not good when you’re about to go out on the hustings).

And still the PN trundled on with the one theme, because the wish had become father to the thought

Then, with an early election rumoured, the narrative was jump-started with the Egrant sensation, only for the PN to develop cold feet, so that in the end it was Joseph Muscat taunting Simon Busuttil to come back to the subject.

And still the PN trundled on with the one theme, because the wish had become father to the thought. 

Finally, don’t underestimate people’s resentment when Malta is disparaged abroad. The PN did not learn the lesson of the last EP elections, held soon after the IIP [passports] fuss mounted by its MEPs. 

Irrespective of the merits of each case – whether it’s IIP, or appointments to EU high offices or even Panama – many people find these antics disturbing.”

‘Feel-good factor trumps governance issues’

Laurence Grech
Former editor of The Sunday Times of Malta

“Like most people, including die-hard Labour supporters, I was stunned by the scale of Joseph Muscat’s triumph in the June 3 general election.

I had reasoned that with so many ‘switchers’ from 2013 declaring they were returning to the Nationalist fold or in any case supporting the Forza Nazzjonali, mainly because of their disappointment, not to say disgust, at the string of scandals marking this administration and the secret bank accounts, kickbacks and assorted malfeasance at its topmost echelons, the huge gap between Labour and PN would have narrowed considerably.

Indeed, I put the chances of a PN victory at 50-50. That this did not turn out to be, and spectacularly so. I can now attribute to at least four reasons:

1. Called upon to choose between upholding morality in government and prizing their personal well-being, most people chose the latter. Muscat played the ‘you never had it so good’ mantra, used by the Conservatives in Britain in the 1960s, to stunning effect.

2. Undoubtedly, the economy has been performing well – unemployment is at a record low, tourism at a record high, for the first time in 35 years government finances have registered a surplus, and business generally is booming. Muscat unfairly took all the credit for this, when in fact the foundations for today’s prosperity had been laid by past Nationalist administrations, with the last one, led by Lawrence Gonzi, shielding the island from the worst effects of the global recession of 2008-2013.

3. Labour exploited its power of incumbency for all it was worth. Voters were bombarded with calls by ministers’ staff asking “if they needed anything”; in the last couple of months hundreds of jobs were given out in parastatal bodies, including, incredibly, the loss-making national airlin, and the Water  Services Corporation (mostly to constituents of Konrad Mizzi, whose portfolio included the WSC); several hundred promotions were given to Armed Forces personnel, some backdated 15 years, literally on the last day of the election campaign; and hundreds of government jobs were given in Gozo, also on the eve of the election.

Labour exploited its power of incumbency for all it was worth

Not to mention the payment of VAT refunds, in record time, to owners of vehicles bought in 2006, of which they were reminded by a personal letter from the Prime Minister.

4. Undoubtedly most people were favourably impressed by the various measures undertaken by the government – among them, reduced utility rates, free childcare for working women, new collective agreements for government employees, advances in civil rights, incentives for first-time buyers and a very favourable environment for developers and property owners (though not for lovers of the environment).

A combination of all these factors obviously led to a far greater number of switchers than in 2013, and perhaps not as vocal, opting for the devil they knew.