Two contests, one candidate... zero credibility

You can normally tell something's very seriously wrong with your country's Prime Minister, when two of his closest lieutenants start joking about his political strategy decisions in public.

Yet this is precisely what happened this week. At one point during a joint press conference, Finance Minister Tonio Fenech and Culture Minister Mario de Marco were asked point blank if they had any intention of contesting the forthcoming PN deputy leadership election themselves (both being rightly considered frontrunners for the job).

Their response? Let me put it this way: had it been a typical SMS message instead of a live reaction, it would have probably been something like: 'LMAO'.

I can't exactly remember whether it was de Marco who offered to be Fenech's campaign manager, or vice versa. But there was something almost clownish about the way they openly derided the idea... as though the question was in itself too ridiculous for words.

Now: under normal circumstances I would be among the very first to appreciate a good joke. But I do have to question what these two ministers found so very funny on this particular occasion.

Where's the punch-line, fellers? Is the position of PN deputy leader now considered the joke of the century? Or has the whole party now waded so far and so deep into the realm of farcical and the ridiculous, that any position associated with it at all is now subject to instant comedy?

Both are distinct possibilities, but I personally subscribe to another hypothesis altogether. I don't think the joke concerns the position of deputy leader in itself... after all, this has been occupied by some pretty serious contenders in the past (Guido de Marco and Censu Tabone, to name but two). No, I think it is the election, and not the contested position, that elicits instant derision. And I don't think we need to look far for the reason why, either.

Meanwhile, it was not just Fenech and de Marco who responded in somewhat unorthodox fashion to the idea that they might be interested in running for the post. Other MPs may have been less openly amused by the prospect... but their reaction was equally anomalous.

Robert Arrigo, for instance, returned an incredibly guarded answer when I asked him the same question this week. He confirmed that he had been approached by several party councilors to contest... but then drifted off into the usual miasma of empty rhetoric that sounds vaguely convincing when you first hear it... until you try and work out what it actually means, and discover that the answer is: 'bugger all'.

Elsewhere, similar questions were greeted by similar expressions of paranoia: with the upshot that nominations for this contest have now been officially open for several days, and... oh look: NOT A SINGLE CANDIDATE has since stepped forward to even express an interest in the job.

OK, I am writing this on Thursday, and I admit this might well change by the time you read it on Sunday. In fact, it had better change: for if it doesn't, the PN will have a full-blown credibility crisis on its hands (like it doesn't have enough of that already).

But even so, the damage will already have been done. We have all seen how there is an obvious reluctance among party officials to take the plunge... and this in turn can only suggest that party officials either do not take the contest seriously themselves (in which case, why the heck should the rest of us?); or - much worse for Gonzi - they don't want to associate themselves more than is necessary with the PN leadership at the moment.

How on earth can that possibly be a good thing for the party? And more to the point: what was Gonzi even thinking, when he decided to open up a deputy leadership contest at such an awkward and inopportune moment for the party?

I don't know, but it is fairly obvious to me that we are talking about yet another political omelette to add to the Lawrence Gonzi cook-book. For let's face it: there is simply no way the PN can possibly benefit by projecting the image of a party in which everyone is simply too scared or too dispirited to take up a position that would normally be considered the second most coveted job in any given political system.

Oh, and if you don't want to take my own word for this... try taking Gonzi's instead. That's right, folks. It seems even Gonzi has belatedly realised what a spectacularly bad idea it was, to hold a deputy leadership contest under the present circumstances. This is what he told The Times last Wednesday, under the telling headline: 'We need a contest'.

"Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi insisted with his party executive members that the upcoming deputy leadership election should be contested by the largest number of candidates possible to show the PN is alive and a catalyst for change."

(Note: he said this the day the nominations opened, when Fenech and de Marco had already had their good chortle, and other MPs - including Jason Azzopardi - had ruled themselves out).

OK, here is a little experiment you can all try out for yourselves at home. If (according to Gonzi) the 'largest number of candidates' reflects a party that is 'alive and a catalyst for change'... what does the 'smallest number of candidates' reflect?

Do, da, dum. Incredible as it seems to me (for yes, I admit it: Gonzi's way of doing politics simply never ceases to amaze me) the prime minister has publicly placed his finger on exactly what is wrong with his own decision to pave the way for a humiliating deputy leadership 'contest'... in which there will obviously be only one serious contender, and quite possibly no one else. (Or at the very most, some token twit just to make up the numbers - which would only make things worse).

By Gonzi's own definition, the Nationalist Party is neither 'alive' nor a 'catalyst for change'. On the contrary: it is so dead that it can't even organise a deputy leadership contest that wasn't farcically pre-ordained. And this in turn need hardly surprise us, for the same Nationalist Party had likewise failed to organise a credible leadership contest last January... when Gonzi ran against himself for the job, and then added insult to injury by boasting about his 96% victory. (Personally, if I were in his place I would have been too embarrassed to admit that, given a choice between myself and nobody, 4% of my party councillors chose nobody. But that's just me...).

Oh, and by the way: Gonzi's words in that article above also reflect on his own re-election last January. That election was contested by only one candidate. Doesn't that mean (again, by Gonzi's own definition) that the PN was 'dead' last January, and remains dead today?

But back to the bogus deputy leadership contest. It will obviously not have escaped public attention that a certain Simon Busuttil happens to be the overwhelming favourite for the post. Nor will it be beyond the public's mental abilities to work out how - in the unlikely event that someone actually does commit political suicide by running against him - it will not be out of genuine optimism that they might win (erm... OK, unless it's Franco Debono: in which all bets are off and literally everything suddenly becomes possible.) In fact I can think of only one plausible reason why anyone in his right mind would even consider taking the plunge, and endure the humiliation of an inevitable, crushing defeat: i.e., so that they might be offered some other position within the party (or some other corresponding personal favour) as compensation.

But there are two problems with that scenario. One: Gonzi will have to remain prime minister (or at least party leader) beyond the next election to actually deliver on any promise he makes today... and, to put it mildly, that is far from a given at the moment.

The second problem is... how can I put this? It's already too late. You see, until I read Gonzi's extraordinary declarations this week, I assumed that the exercise of identifying a suitable token candidate (to create the semblance of a real contest, instead of yet another foregone conclusion) had already long been concluded, and that the sacrificial lamb had already been selected and groomed for his or her engineered defeat.

Indeed, I would have assumed this was such a vital step that it would have had to be taken BEFORE announcing Tonio Borg as a replacement for John Dalli, thereby firing the starting pistol for the race.

But no. Evidently, Gonzi thought otherwise, and instead chose to fire that pistol before he had any idea of what would happen next. And the PN is now in full panic mode as a result - having belatedly realised that only a complete and utter moron would actually volunteer to commit suicide on Gonzi's behalf precisely now... and that even worse, the party no longer has any goodies up its sleeve to actually offer as compensation to any volunteer, even if one were to step forward anyway.

So Gonzi is reduced to not only pleading and begging his own party executives to take the plunge on his behalf - but he has even made a public confession of his own ineptitude to the press, thus ensuring that his quandary is visible to us all to see (and laugh at).

And of course, even in the unlikely event that Dr Gonzi does successfully persuade some gullible party official to stand for this election... it is simply inconceivable that the public will not immediately see right through the ruse. (Unless the public really is as stupid as Gonzi evidently thinks it is... in which case: well, you all know the saying about 'getting the government you deserve'...)

I am sorry, but none of this is in any way serious. I would almost find it amusing (as Fenech and de Marco did earlier this week), were it not so utterly painful to watch. And much as I hate to keep harping on this one simple fact: it is by no means coincidental that Gonzi has organized two leadership contests, and that both turned out to be farcical in the extreme.

It just so happens that I am in the mood to be rather blunt today. So it will put it as simply as I can. The lack of seriousness exhibited by the deputy leadership contest is nothing but a reflection of the lack of seriousness of the party leadership itself. And it is the present leadership (or lack thereof) that is responsible for the sorry state the PN is in today... and not the lone rebel backbenchers or loudmouth malcontents, who are ultimately only responding to the natural vacuum created by this selfsame leadership crisis.

The truth that everyone has now recognised - but few dare speak aloud, at least to date - is that ever since 2004 Lawrence Gonzi and his chosen minions have chipped steadily away at the credibility of the Nationalist Party... and in eight years these people have succeeded in reducing a once respectable party to a pale shadow of its former self.

So in a nutshell: the PN now desperately needs something to salvage its battered credibility, and on this we can all agree. But that 'something' is clearly NOT a bogus deputy-leadership contest. On the contrary: it is a leadership election that is required for that purpose: and preferably, one with more than just a single candidate this time round.