Skeletons in your cupboard

There is some danger in addressing the issues of the past to justify one's continued presence in the future.

I am not one to forget the past. Indeed, if anyone had a memory they would remember that in the years after 1987, the Nationalists under Fenech Adami preached reconciliation as an excuse to allow those who were culpable of being involved in violence and corruption to avoid prosecution. Those who orchestrated violence or carried out summary arrests were not only ignored, they were also given promotions.

These names - with the exception of Lawrence Pullicino, of course - are highlighted by Dione Borg in his book. But Borg's book, for the most part, sounds like a juke box armed with just one disk.

'Skeletons in our cupboards' is a meek way of putting it.

If you had to look closely, it is very clear that many things that are being marketed today have nothing to do with a particular anniversary to commemorate our cruel past, but more to do with the conclusions of a strategy meeting to deviate all the focus to the bad old boys that overshadowed our small country before 1987.

I'm glad that we have come to this conclusion.

But isn't someone supposed to speak up and say that 'we should be moving on'?

And what is the message here?

That a different government will be repeating these horrible incidents, or simply that nobody is suited to run this country?

It's simply wrong, and it will backfire.

It also betrays a short-sightedness on the Prime Minister's part. He knows that this kind of campaigning will lead to a rise in temperature, and resentment.

If we look at parallels, this idea of not looking at the past was crucial in the rebuilding of Communist Eastern Europe, and more so in South Africa.

But then, political autocracy, or apartheid politics, are still not remotely comparable to what happened in Malta.

Yet Communist Eastern Europe moved on, and re-elected reformed Communist parties.

It was bad, but not as bad as Father Beirut described it when he was the Bishop's PRO.

Then again, what is more surprising is that when people like myself - and others such as Toni Abela and Wenzu Mintoff - campaigned after 1987 to have real executive action taken against those who carried out these vile acts, next to nothing happened.

They were ignored by the authorities and expelled from the PL. They are now back in the PL.

I recall secret meetings with Eddie Fenech Adami about the corruption that happened in the 1980s. And all I can say is that little action was taken. 
Perhaps now is the time to talk about them.

Perhaps the man wanted to have reconciliation, but then, the 'wanted' just does not hold water, because if one had to look at the language and actions used by the PN over the last 25 years, it has been always been a throwback to those bad old days.

25 years ago - or even 30 years ago - is a very long time, I do not think I can forget them.

I am quite surprised to see people who were never there trying their best to romanticise this period.

Most people who were in the milieu of all this, are traditionally rather lukewarm about drawing conclusions about the past and the future.

Most of those who sacrificed their time and careers will look back and state how their actions were mildly appreciated by those who led them into battle.

They are angrier still with those who have surrounded themselves by yes men who were never around in the first place.

Perhaps the turning point happened when one of the more sinister and ugly personalities of those years suddenly saw the light and together with Fenech Adami, played to the tune of the propaganda campaign.

I am referring to the Zejtun thug Ganni Psaila.

Here was a man who after being splashed all over In-Nazzjon and depicted as being one of the evil characters of those years suddenly discovered God and the PN.

He sat side by side with Fenech Adami in Hamrun preaching like some kind of converted Forrest Gump.

Later, the self-converted Jesus freak died in a fall during a robbery. He had declared that God had changed him.

And there were those who believed.

There were others who saw the light.

The hate figure of the eighties, Eileen Montesin who would lovingly brainwash children on Dardir Malta and make jokes about 'rabbits' (sic Eddie Fenech Adami), later would cross the border and praise the man she had so willingly ridiculed.

The list is, obviously, endless.

But of course those who crossed the border are no longer the ones to criticise and poke fun at.

The ones who need to be ridiculed and demonised are those who were hardly kids 25 years ago and had absolutely no say and no commitment to the violence and corruption of those days.

The very fact that we are discussing this very issue is proof that the ploy to refract attention to this matter is working.

It succeeds in shifting our watch from the real issues that should have a bearing on our political future.