When it’s wrong to be right

After a week of astounding U-turns and 'gas down gol-hajt'-type traffic pile-ups, I was vaguely reminded of how a certain somebody once rubbished the entire concept of sites like Facebook as 'ephemeral' and 'inconsequential' little phases that one eventually outgrows.

Indeed one might eventually outgrow such websites - it seems to be in the nature of these things to be forever superseded by newer and more sophisticated versions... and in my case, this always seems to happen when I've only just worked out how to actually use the damn thing. But for the present it is on Facebook that most of our recent political suicides have taken place; and it is Facebook status updates by impulsive politicians that now make instant headline 'news'.

And oh look: the same ephemeral and inconsequential website has virtually demolished two political careers in the last two weeks alone. (Though of course we shall have to wait and see: the way political fortunes keep turning around in this country - and at such speed, too - both those careers might come bouncing back with a vengeance, you never know.)

But at present, they are both in the doldrums, and apart from reconfirming the perils of a Facebook account for the politically-minded and large-mouthed amongst us, what makes these two analogous cases particularly interesting is that they mirror each other from across the political divide.

It started with Marlene Farrugia, the Labour MP who last week candidly stated what the rest of us could easily have confirmed just by looking in the same general direction. Government had screwed up badly by unleashing a patently flawed and dangerously vulnerable citizenship-by-investment programme, which was so poorly planned and clumsily executed that it had to be amended no fewer than three times (by which point it had inflicted untold damage to our international reputation).

The second case concerned Kevin Plumpton, one of the younger PN MEP candidates who made a name for himself by protesting against the same citizenship scheme only two weeks ago... but who last Thursday called for his party to withdraw its judicial protest against the scheme, because (with only a minor and barely perceptible little tweak) it was now "in the national interest" to implement it.

Both got clobbered for their pains: Farrugia by the party faithful, who almost literally showed her both the door and the boot they would use to kick her out of it (she is in fact retiring from politics, though she denies it has anything to with this event). Plumpton, on the other hand, got clobbered by his own party: which has now precluded him from its media events, though he is still permitted to represent the PN at the MEP elections next June.

Which is basically another way of saying: "we still want this guy to be our candidate; we just don't want any of you to vote for him, that's all".

Hm. OK, I admit there are significant differences between the two cases. I am unaware of any dramatic turn-around in Farrugia's position regarding the IIP scheme itself; while Plumpton's triple backward somersault into an empty pool (ouch!) was pretty clear for all to see.

But in one respect they are identical. Both are cases in which party representatives have been chided or abused for being RIGHT, while their party was wrong.

In Farrugia's case, vindication came swiftly. Within days of her outburst, government announced a revised scheme which now met with the Commission's approval. And my, what a surprise: it was basically a straight enactment of Farrugia's own earlier suggestion to include a basic residence condition (which suddenly makes everything hunky dory... though I for one fail to see exactly why).

But while Marlene Farrugia has essentially been proved right, she still bears the stigma of one who has 'spoken against her party', and has even been compared to former PN maverick Franco Debono. The irony almost takes one's breath away... these are, after all, the same hard-boiled Labour supporters who only two years ago had championed Franco Debono as though he had fallen from the heavens to deliver them from the Gonzi administration.

And it's not the only irony either. Had the Labour Party listened to Farrugia six months ago instead of only yesterday, an entire avalanche of damaging international criticism might have very easily been averted. Sure, part of this avalanche may have been started by little pebbles flicked downhill by the two Nationalist MEPs... but let's face it; they would have had far less ammunition to supply the European Parliament with, had the original scheme not been so blatantly flawed in the first place.

Conversely, this also means that it was all along in the Labour Party's interests - and by extension, in the interest of its supporters - to actually listen to Marlene Farrugia... as in fact it eventually did, albeit when held at gunpoint by the European Commission. So by aggressively demanding that she now quit the party for her perceived 'disloyalty', Labour Party supporters are actively ditching someone whose advice would have spared their party a lot of blushes, and can presumably benefit the same party in future, too.

And this, I think, tells us a heck of a lot about how these people - who admittedly might not be representative of all Labourites, but certainly the sentiment is widespread - actually regard their party. Labour supporters do not care about how badly a Labour government bruises itself as it clumsily plods along; they only care that it is left to plod along without facing any criticism of any kind whatsoever... least of all internal criticism.

It matters even less if its critics are right... in fact, this would arguably incense the party faithful all the more. Suddenly it seems to be sacrilegious - nay, treacherous - to be 'right' while your party leader is 'wrong'.

Onto Plumpton's case now: which is slightly different in that it tells us more about the Nationalist Party than about any of its supporters. As outlined above, Kevin Plumpton had until last Thursday echoed the same basic chorus chanted by his party in both local and European Parliaments. The sale of citizenship is wrong in principle; it is an affront to European values and therefore must be scrapped immediately, to be replaced with one that is (let's face it) only marginally different.

And here we get to the interesting part: following the agreement reached last Thursday between government and Commission, the scheme does indeed reflect all the basic points that had characterised the Opposition's criticism... all except one, the teenie-weenie detail that the very concept on which all such schemes are based is itself gravely immoral.

But we all know that politicians have selective memories: and having duly chosen to ignore that particular aspect of his own party's position, Plumpton must have reasoned that... "Hey! All our own suggestions - residency, transparency, and so on -have now been taken on board: which makes it theoretically the same sort of scheme we would have come up with ourselves. So what's the sense in keeping up the opposition? Let us embrace the new scheme, claim victory and lend a helping hand instead..."

Erm: sorry to interrupt, Mr Plumpton, but there is a small problem. That's the sort of thinking one would expect from an ordinary, reasonable human under similar circumstances. You're no longer an ordinary human being, remember? Not since you became a Nationalist Party electoral candidate, and like all other politicians found you had to check in your brain with the baggage attendant for the duration of the campaign.

Suddenly, things which make perfect sense to an outsider are not only deeply irrational, but (and here is where it starts sounding familiar) also sacrilegious. What matters now is no longer what's correct or sensible for all concerned... but only what makes the Nationalist Party look good or (in this instance) save a little of the face that it went and stuck in the blender.

And having craned its neck out so far to annihilate this scheme utterly from the face of the planet... it does not exactly look good for the PN to suddenly around and say: "Hiya folks. Remember all that stuff we've been banging on about for the last four or five months? You know, about the principle of how national identity can ever, ever be monetised or commodified in any conceivable way? Well, we've changed our minds. So long as purchasers spend a few months residing in our country, we don't actually care whether they would have paid a paltry sum to buy into our national identity, and haul their entire extended families with them. In fact, we now think it's 'in the national interest' for Malta to be swamped with all the people we ourselves described as criminals, crooks, drug traffickers, Mafiosi and tribal warlords until just last week. So bring 'em all in. Plenty of room for everybody..."

No, from that perspective I must concede that the PN had no real option but to shut little Plumpton's mouth before he could do himself any more damage. But at the same time, one simply has to ask: what will the PN do now? Will it enact the same basic pattern followed by Labour in Marlene Farrugia's case, and acquiesce to the demand anyway?

Personally, I fail to see what choice it has. With the Commission itself now asserting that the passport issue is 'settled', the only thing is left sticking out like an ugly sore thumb is a judicial protest very foolishly filed by the Nationalist Party on the eve of the Commission's giant U-turn. Like Farrugia before him, Plumpton is entirely correct to state that this protest should now be withdrawn. Surely the PN cannot keep insisting that a scheme is in breach of international law... when it has just been endorsed by the EU's equivalent of the Man From Del Monte. For if they do persist in threatening to withdraw future citizenships granted under this scheme... well, who would be defying the European Commission then, aye?

Granted, all things are possible... including yet another dramatic reversal of roles, where it is suddenly Simon Busuttil (and no longer Joseph Muscat) who insists that he himself is right, while the rest of the known universe is wrong. But I somehow doubt it. My guess is that Busuttil will bow to the inevitable and withdraw that judicial protest... thus proving Plumpton right, just as Muscat had earlier proved Marlene Farrugia right by acting on her advice only after she had already been drawn and quartered by the party grass-roots.

Both these unsightly realities heavily underscore the same basic point. In contemporary Maltese politics, it is still perfectly possible to be wrong when you are right, and right when you are wrong.