Is the PN out of denial mode?

It was also a brave effort to get the PN out of a mindset that it does not seem to have shaken off as yet: being in denial by refusing to acknowledge the utter muddle that was staring it in the face since well before the disastrous electoral result of three months ago.

It took Labour 25 years to clearly and unequivocally acknowledge the mistakes of the Mintoff era, even though Joseph Muscat did this without actually spelling out an unequivocal apology. He just said that Labour had paid dearly for its past mistakes and that it was now determined not to repeat them. That was enough for many. The mistakes of the PN in government were of a different kind, but they also need acknowledging in a clear way.

Busuttil's deputy for Parliamentary Affairs, Mario de Marco, did point out one particular instance about which he insisted the PN should apologise: the case of Joanne Cassar, who was prevented from marrying because she was born a man and had undergone gender reassignment surgery. The PN administration had legally foiled Joanne's attempt to have her right to marry respected by the Maltese state, and she had to open up a case against her country at the European Court of Human rights in Strasbourg - a case that has now been suspended in view of the changes in the law that are currently being approved in Parliament. Ironically, this change in the law now has the backing of the PN opposition as well!

The point of the Joanne Cassar case, of course, goes further than the apology that is certainly due to her. Seen together with how the PN administration acted in other matters, such as the divorce and the IVF issues, it was part of the scenario in which the PN administration was coming across as an obtuse and mulish conservative regime. Many - too many - concluded that it deserved the order of the boot and complied.

There were other factors that led to the PN defeat, of course. Most of these were also attitude problems and I need not go into them once again. These continued to reinforce the perception that the time for change had come.

Yet, there were those who agreed with and defended the ultra-conservative stance, little realising the truth that, with such an attitude, the PN can never have the support of the majority of the electorate. Maltese society is not homogeneous, and in order to get majority approval in an election, any party has to bridge the differences between factions and create a common front. The PN successfully did so under Eddie Fenech Adami.

Joseph Muscat's impressive electoral victory was also the result of his successful creation of a coalition of people with different ideas and attitudes. Hence his switch from 'party' to 'movement' was a crafty move. That it was stupidly derided by the PN speaks volumes. Muscat's ploy worked, but it will always be subject to one big looming drawback: if in the future Muscat is perceived as having betrayed one faction of the movement, he will lose the support of the majority, impressive though it might be.

Some avid PN supporters and activists are still completely missing the importance of the PN's need to attract diverse - and sometimes opposing - factions of society. They show this when they talk of the previous prime minister not deserving the electoral debacle that he was regaled with at the end of his 'successful' administration. In other words, they are still in denial mode. I know that sometimes things are said in order to sweeten the pill, but too much of this can be misinterpreted and help bolster the mentality that the PN was an unfortunate victim of mistaken assessments rather than the victim of its own shortsightedness.

As Simon Busuttil said last Sunday, "We cannot say the people who did not vote for us were mistaken... 36,000 people cannot be wrong."

Sometimes, I get the feeling that Simon Busuttil's task of shocking PN supporters out of denial mode is much more of a daunting challenge than that of persuading past PN voters, who abstained or voted Labour on March 9, to come back to the fold.

Yet for Simon Busuttil to succeed in enticing the lost sheep back, the PN must first clear its decks by ensuring that no one among its crew is still in denial mode.

Situation vacant: judge

Most of the proposals made by the commission for judicial reform headed by former European Human Rights judge Giovanni Bonello make a lot of sense.

Yet there is one idea that, if adopted, would probably create more difficulties than it solves: the suggestion that vacancies in the judiciary should be filled after a public call for applications.

I acknowledge that the present system, with the prime minister having the authority to appoint judges and magistrates - as if it was some God-given right ¬- is flawed. It is, of course, the result of the prime minister having been given all the rights and privileges enjoyed by the colonial master when the country assumed its sovereignty upon its independence.

In spite of this, the system has turned up a large number of valid and respected members of the judiciary. There were some unfortunate exceptions, but these were a tiny minority.

My doubts crop up after I ask myself, How many of the valid and learned judges and magistrates this country has had would have responded to a public call for applications and actually applied for the job? I know for a fact that many a time, the minister responsible for justice has to persuade (with some insistence) valid and experienced lawyers who are reluctant to leave the practice of their profession to become members of the bench. The various ministers in the various administrations normally try to pick up persons who seem to fit the bill, but many of these would need a lot of persuasion before accepting. Some, in fact, refuse for one reason or another.

Will a system where prospective members of the judiciary have to request consideration after a public call for applications improve the crop of the legal profession that makes it to the bench? Or will head hunting still be the order of the day, with the person so head hunted having to be persuaded to fill in the application form, rather than fill the post?

Will such a system ensure a better level of integrity, personal commitment and efficiency in Malta's members of the judiciary?

I wonder.