On March 1, 1953, the Soviet Union’s dictator, Josef Stalin, retired to his quarters with strict instructions not to be disturbed. Nothing was heard from him for hours. His guards and close associates were too scared to knock on his door. When his housekeeper plucked up courage to enter his room at 11am the following day, Stalin lay on the floor, unconscious and incontinent of urine. He died three days later.
After 30 years at the helm of the Soviet Union, Stalin’s death left a gaping void. In the chaos, Nikita Khrushchev grabbed control. Yet, Stalin’s overpowering shadow loomed large over his country and successor, even from the grave.
In his brutal reign, Stalin embarked on the totalitarianisation of his party, perfecting its command and control structure. He used his political cunning and lack of compassion or morality to establish absolute autocracy, destroying the party as a political organisation. Stalin built a huge personality cult, elevating himself to god-like status.
Even after his death, despite the destruction and murder Stalin inflicted, there were real dangers in denouncing him. Stalin still occupied his pedestal. For three years, silent ‘destalinisation’ took place. Stalin’s policies and glorification were secretly reversed.
Finally, in February 1956, Khrushchev attacked Stalin’s megalomania in his famous secret speech to the 20th Congress. He derided Stalin’s self-glorification, personality cult and poor leadership. Khrushchev bravely condemned his predecessor’s crimes and destroyed Stalin’s image as an infallible leader. This was a watershed moment.
It was a calculated gamble by Khrushchev. Having been so close to Stalin he risked damning himself by association. But everyone else in the party owed their positions to Stalin. Nobody could point a finger at Khrushchev without pointing it at themselves.
Finally, public destalinisation began. It peaked when Stalin’s body was removed from Lenin’s mausoleum and Stalingrad was renamed Volgograd. Stalin was finally exorcised.
Like Khrushchev, Robert Abela was closely linked to his predecessor, having served as his consultant and then becoming his chosen one in the leadership battle. Like Khrushchev, Abela is faced with a massive overbearing presence of his predecessor. Wary of angering Muscat’s loyal base and triggering Muscat’s ire, Abela has treaded carefully. He walks the fine line between continuity and reversal of Muscat’s destructive corruption.
Abela knows that much of his support is dependent on his continued protection of his former boss
As Abela consolidates his own power base, replacing MPs with handpicked loyalists, he slowly emerges from Muscat’s shadow. His own popularity confirmed from one survey to the next, Abela is emboldened. Yet, he knows that much of that support is dependent on his continued protection of his former boss and Muscat’s inner circle. Openly denouncing Muscat might see much of that support dissipate.
Yet, the pressure on Abela mounts. Muscat’s treachery continues to reveal itself in the FATF greylisting and now by earning Malta a place on the UK’s list of money launderers and terrorist financiers. Slowly, even the diehards are turning on their former ‘kink’.
Desmond Zammit Marmarà has come out with his own secret speech to the 20th Congress. In a breath of fresh air, a party loyalist, former Labour local councillor and former executive secretary of the Labour Party’s think tank Fondazzjoni IDEAT, has admitted that he and many others were duped by Muscat. Having voted for Muscat to become leader, Zammit Marmarà conceded that Muscat’s “new dawn” was only a “false dawn”.
He confessed he did not believe the awful revelations about Muscat’s corruption at first. Now he bravely condemned “the collapse in the standards of good governance, the rule of law and the fight against corruption”. Muscat’s “catchy idealistic political slogans” concealed his “unholy alliance with big business interests”.
Like Khrushchev, Zammit Marmarà attacked his former leader for his misrule and his crimes against the nation and the party. Like Khrushchev, Zammit Marmarà denounced his ex-leader’s actions as inconsistent with party ideology.
Zammit Marmarà urged Abela to move from the silent ‘demuscatisation’ to the public demuscatisation. He insisted Abela must “once and for all disassociate himself from Joseph Muscat”. He pleaded with Abela to stop listening to the “hardcore PL supporters who still idolise Muscat” and to hear the rest of the Labour supporters who “believe Muscat betrayed their confidence”. The Caruana Galizia inquiry conclusions now provide Abela with the perfect justification for heeding Zammit Marmarà’s advice.
Like Khrushchev, Abela must also remove those who did his predecessor’s bidding. Just as Lavrentiy Beria (Stalin’s chief of the secret police) was summarily executed, Zammit Marmarà implores Abela to “get rid of all those elements within the administration whose ethical standards leave much to be desired”. The inquiry squarely heaps responsibility for those in cabinet who failed to lift a finger as evil raged.
When Khrushchev denounced Stalin, the Nobel prize winner and Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn proclaimed Khrushchev had “spoken out of a movement of the heart”, motivated by moral conscience. Zammit Marmarà appealed to Abela’s moral conscience to denounce his predecessor. Otherwise, “Muscat’s negative legacy will remain like a sword of Damocles permanently hanging over the Labour Party”.
Zammit Marmarà is not alone from Labour’s fold clamouring for demuscatisation. Mark Camilleri, Labour delegate and National Book Council head, recently announced he will publish a book which will “expose previously untold facts about (Labour) government’s corruption”. He hopes his revelations will lead to new arrests and police investigations. Like Khrushchev, Camilleri is concerned about his country’s and party’s future and felt compelled “to do my part to clean up this mess”.
Zammit Marmarà’s noble courage was not appreciated by Muscat’s hardcore trolls. He was subjected to vicious abuse. He was accused of being a “wannabee”, not being a genuine ‘Laburist’, of writing half-truths and of being more hypocritical than the Pharisees.
The worst insult came from a former Mintoff minister and Labour grandee Reno Calleja. He called Zammit Marmarà a drainage rat in his rant: “once the ship starts sinking the first to climb down the ropes will be the drainage rats”. Calleja’s viciousness is not surprising. As chairman of the Malta-China Friendship Society, he defended Mao Zedong, the world’s all-time worst mass murderer. In his blind fury, Calleja let slip one important gem: Labour’s moral ship is sinking, scuttled by Calleja-style brutal cruelty against its own loyal grassroots.