Yes, but whom can we trust?

On Saturday, Lawrence Gonzi asked us to trust him with our vote. I won't begrudge him this entreaty. A Prime Minister is surely entitled to ask for trust on the eve of an election; and besides, if Gonzi sounded even half as sincere throughout his 10 year run as PM it would be a good deal easier to take him at his word precisely now.

But try as I might, 'trusting Gonzi' just doesn't come easy to me. Not only has the same Gonzi upset and even alarmed me in the past, by seeking to impose a hopelessly outdated moral code onto the entire nation... but he has deceived us often, too.

Last Thursday he insisted that the PN supports full equality for transgender persons... at the same time as his own government was actively trying to deny a transsexual her rights in the European court.

Obviously I will not base my vote only on this issue, but I have to confess the bald lie both shocked and disconcerted me... and while I can't assert outright that he also lied about corruption, I for one cannot take Gonzi seriously when he says he knew nothing at all about the oil scandal. Even if true, the admission itself marks a grave indictment of the current administration: so many decisions of which have (coincidentally, of course) facilitated the entire operation to begin with.

Besides: whether or not Gonzi knew is really quite immaterial. His government was and still is politically responsible for the scandal. Yet to date not a single government official, at any level, has shouldered any form of political responsibility at all.

How is this even possible, in an EU member state?

Elsewhere the same Lawrence Gonzi has something of a personal history when it comes to ignoring or minimizing corruption allegations. He had even more reason to suspect corruption in the BWSC contract - there was even an email which appeared to confirm that people in government had been involved in talks with the Danish bidder. 

Malta's emissions levels were upwardly revised (thus changing the tender specifications in midstream, while also increasing pollution in a country which already has the highest levels of respiratory disease among children in the EU) in what was a blatant attempt to favour one bidder.

I for one was simply flabbergasted when Gonzi refused to even entertain the possibility that there was anything wrong... even when the national auditor himself complained about the perception of corruption throughout.

And it only gets worse the closer we get to this election. The latest is that at least one person now faces criminal charges for accepting a gift (in the form of single silver plate) from George Farrugia. So can anyone explain how the Finance Minister himself publicly admitted to also accepting a gift from the same person... and not only are no criminal charges issued in his regard, but the matter is not even investigated by the police?

Oh and before you all bleat away the same lousy excuses uttered at that news conference... excuse me, but have any of you actually seen that clock with your own eyes? Has it been valued by an antiques appraiser to determine whether Tonio Fenech was telling the truth? Sorry, but again I just don't buy it. And I won't accept it as a freebie, either... as Fenech once did with a flight to Valencia to watch Arsenal. 

Meanwhile there is another reason why trust is not forthcoming when bidden. Never mind the stench of corruption that has pervaded ALL the present administration's decisions in the energy sector. Let us imagine that there was no corruption at all. The decisions themselves were still all wrong. 

With only seven years to go before the expiry of a commitment to produce 20% of our energy from renewable sources... we are still 100% dependent on oil. They didn't even manage a single wind farm, for crying out loud. Even the present plans for gas conversion are entirely skewed: Gonzi is dangerously wrong to rely exclusively on a pipeline to deliver gas from Italy. Just look at the problems Italy now faces as a result of its own pipeline to Libya. Now consider that in the same Italy, Beppe Grillo has just garnered 25% of the vote on a promise NOT to form part of government. 

As a result, nobody can guarantee that there will even be an Italian government with which to forge an agreement when it comes to the crunch. 

And while I have reservations about Labour's energy plans (mostly concerning the timeframes, which strike me as just slightly optimistic) - it is still a better plan because it guarantees that control of our own energy infrastructure remains firmly within our own grasp, and not anybody else's.

As for the claims that Gonzi's government has successfully weathered the economic 'storm'... sorry, but I don't buy that one either. Of course it depends on how you measure 'success'. I am not overly impressed by employment figures alone, because the underpinning reality is that Gonzi's government also enjoys the equivalent of a blank cheque - it borrows from its own people, and (unlike the other countries in the eurozone whose debts are owed to the World Bank) never finds itself having to pay any of it back.

Has Gonzi's government been responsible in the way it borrowed and the way it went on to spend this money? No it has not. Gonzi is the architect of the highest national debt Malta has ever seen. He may have saved the dockyard - I won't deny him that small satisfaction - but in so doing he also created a second bottomless financial pit at Enemalta: which now owes €800 million, and as such jacks up our debt to 90% of GDP (that is to say, considerably more than Spain's debt ratio... and just look at that country today.) 

On another level I find it odd that so many people would point towards Gonzi's economic management as proof of his trustworthiness, when his own finance minister has failed to produce a single budget in the past three years that actually met with the EU's approval. 

All those budgets had to be re-drawn up, following objections that they were based on unrealistic projections of economic growth. Now: do I really need to add that ALL Gonzi's current electoral promises are based on the same flawed projections? 

Anyway: the fact of the matter is that - for these and many, many, many, MANY other reasons (one of which involves an unexplained death in police custody, and the fact that journalists have had their phones tapped and information passed on to the PN) - I can't trust Lawrence Gonzi to administer this country in the nation's own interest.

He has after all had 10 whole years to do precisely that... and he failed. 

This brings me to the other alternatives. Can I trust Labour? I'm not sure, but there is one strong argument against. Labour's record in the human rights department is, I fear, simply appalling. Rock bottom, in point of fact. 

I remember the 1980s, though I don't still feel the same emotional attachment to those days that so many people my age clearly still do. But though it no longer pisses me off the way it used to, I can't simply pretend that people weren't beaten up in the lock-up under the Mintoff/KMB tandem 30 years ago. I can't deny that peaceful meetings were broken up through use of tear-gas and rubber bullets; that people were shot and in some cases killed; that the university was humiliated and reduced to a glorified trade school, among a host of other calamities. 

But again, as Gonzi made clear, it boils down to trust. Joseph Muscat tries to assure me that those days are now firmly behind Labour. Can I believe him? 

Well, considering that he himself couldn't have been more than around 10 when all that happened... and considering the sheer effort that has gone into appealing precisely to people like myself (i.e., who have memories of those days, yet no longer identify with or particularly like what the Nationalist Party has since become)... the question really becomes, can we afford to give him the benefit of the doubt which clearly lingers?

Well, I for one do believe that there has been a change from the days of Mintoff. People who argue otherwise tend to betray the flaw in their argument the moment you ask for concrete examples. Trying to frighten me with Karmenu Vella or Leo Brincat is a little like affixing a 'beware of the dog' sign above the kennel of a Chihuahua puppy. I've interviewed both those people more than once, and I found them about as threatening in demeanour as Puttinu (actually less: for as those blessed ads go... "Puttinu Scares".)

So if that's the extent of your argument, you're going to have to try a lot harder. 

Besides, I can't deny that the Labour campaign has been rooted precisely in a call for unity and to end our odious national culture of political division. As somebody who has yearned for an end to this ghastly culture for decades, I cannot ignore the fact that they are at least trying to assure me that they really do intend to do it (whether they will be allowed to do so by the increasingly nauseating peddlers of hate, is of course another matter).

If the PN made even the tiniest of efforts in the same direction, my gut feeling tells me that the two parties would not be quite so far apart in the polls right now. But of course they did the exact opposite: they breathed hatred and division, and are still breathing both right now.

As for the 'cataclysmic visions' of what a Labour government might be guilty of in future... well, it's been a while since I felt any genuine fear of ghosts, ghouls, boogie-men and monsters under my bed. And that is precisely how ridiculous the scaremongering looks, coming as it does from people who are themselves the present-day equivalent of 'Il-Fusellu'.  

Bottom line is that I now feel I have more (much more) to fear from the PN than from Labour, precisely as a result of those very people who are shouting the loudest on the PN's behalf. So I can hardly be expected to tear my hair out if Muscat becomes Prime Minister next Sunday. (Too much hair to tear out at the moment, to tell you the truth...)

This leaves AD, and here the question changes considerably. It's not so much whether we can 'trust' The Green Party. It's more a question of whether we can genuinely believe in their ability to actually gain a seat in parliament.

On all other levels I have no difficulties trusting Michael Briguglio or anyone else in that party. These people have never lied to me before: their policy platforms have always been honest and squeaky, squeaky clean; and despite several leadership changes they have remained remarkably consistent on all the issues they have ever championed.

So yes: all in all trusting AD comes easy to me. Faith in their ability to make history, on the other hand, is another matter.

As someone who has given AD a vote in every election since 1992, I confess I am disappointed that all these years later it remains such a microscopic organisation: talking about 2,000 votes in one district almost as if it were the equivalent of scaling Mount Everest in your boxers (when, after 30 years, it should really be a frigging walk in the park). And I was disappointed to see the extent to which the party has migrated to the Left. We don't need more left-wing parties in Malta, you know - we already have two, and, well, just look at them.

BUT... I can't deny that AD's manifesto is quite simply light years ahead of the other two. OK, I'm not crazy about the minimum wage idea (it represents a level of government interference in the private sector that the liberal sceptic in me can only question) but on everything else they simply haven't put a single foot wrong. I agree with their drugs policy, and more so with their constant warnings of outrageous government spending... and I am inclined to believe them when they say they will act as a voice of reason in parliament.

Lastly, I was impressed by their campaign. Their contributions to debates were head and shoulders above those of both Labour and PN... and besides: the call to 'make history' may be a long shot, but if they do pull it off it... heck, it will also be true.

The issue, therefore, becomes one of priorities. What result appeals to me more? A simple change in government - which I do believe this country needs, but which will only take limited form with Labour instead of PN? Or a third party in parliament to act as a voice of reason, and to offer me the one thing I have always wanted but never really had in this country... a Parliamentary representative to actually speak on my behalf?

All along there is another possible choice - not to vote at all, which I myself am on record saying makes sense, in a country where the usual election turn-out resembles a referendum to retain Saddam Hussein as Rais.

I still believe people should be left in absolute freedom to vote (or not vote) as they choose. But I have revised my own voting intentions for this election. Yes, I will plod my way to the polling station next Saturday. As for how I will vote, I think it should be obvious from the above. 

Let's just say that if my vote were a Formula One race about to begin, the starting grid would look like this: Green in pole position, Red raring to go right behind, and Blue... oh, Blue is somewhere far, far in the distance... and oh look, it's developed engine trouble before the race has even begun...

And that's it, folks. Happy voting.