European Parliament president tells Malta "Seize the moment"

European Parliament President Pat Cox yesterday urged the Maltese people to "seize the moment" presented by European Union membership.

"The choice is yours, not mine, our door is open, our hearts are open to you, you have a long, complex and wonderful history of survival. I believe, but my belief is still not your choice, that is your privilege, but I believe you can thrive in that context, and I would say to you personally, I really think you should seize the moment, but the choice to seize it or not is yours."

Mr Cox made his comments in parliament in a speech in which his emphasis was that Malta would not lose its identity if it joined the European Union.

His listeners in the strangers` gallery included former prime minister and the head of the Campaign for National Independence, Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici.

Mr Cox announced that Maltese parliamentarians would be invited to participate in the European Parliament debate in November on the European Commission`s country-by-country assessment of who at that moment would be deemed to have fulfilled the requirements for membership.

He welcomed the decisions taken by the EU to recognise the Maltese language as one of its own official languages upon Malta`s accession and praised Malta for the "unparalleled" results it had achieved in the membership negotiations with regard to the free movement of workers and the purchase of residences by foreigners.

At the opening of his speech, Mr Cox said this was a very special year with regard to the enlargement challenge. If the calendar which had been set worked out, then for the EU, politically, this would be the "year of enlargement."

The European Parliament, he said, was deeply committed to enlargement. This would be the largest, most diverse and challenging enlargement to date.

Mr Cox said that during his visit he wanted to listen to the diversity of opinion that existed in Malta on European Union membership.

The European Parliament president said that membership of Malta and Cyprus in the European Union would bring in a new elan, a new spring to the EU`s step in terms of the Euro-Mediterranean dialogue, the Barcelona process and bridge-building.

"In that bridge-building role you can offer something of real and tangible worth to the wider European Union in terms of your historic experience, your crossroads location, diplomatic and political contacts and capacities."

Mr Cox said that he was an Irish European and like the Maltese, an islander proud of the traditions and identity of his own people.

His country in the 20th century had had two acts of Irish liberation. Although the country gained political independence in 1922 after a long experience of colonisation it remained dependent on the UK.

This was a period of political sovereignty and economic stagnation.

Then came the second act of Irish liberation through engagement with the European Union which cut the umbilical chord of stagnation and opened up the country to a wider set of possibilities.

"I believe it has been a truly liberating experience in those terms."

At the time, he recalled, there was a very active debate in Ireland. Some had argued that in the EU, all resources and wealth were sucked into the centre and the periphery would simply provide the labour force for the rich centre. But this proved to be an illusion and the contrary was the case. True, the competitive economy did not come overnight. It was a deep struggle inside Irish political and economic systems, but when it came it offered transformation.

Indeed, the periphery, including Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Greece, had shown a dramatically greater capacity for growth than the centre.

There had also been a major debate on funding. Indeed, the funding given to Ireland was of enormous benefit for the infrastructure, environment projects and transport.

But the bread and butter benefit of EU membership had not been the funding, but the market access, with Irish exports having shot up to 82.5 billion euros now from just five billion euros in 1973.

"It`s the thing which has allowed my children`s generation an opportunity which my father`s generation was not bold enough to dream of, and which my own generation could only hope for."

"It has allowed us to begin to bring our people home, to become a place that sells goods and services, but not our birthright, our identity, our self-awareness and our place."

Mr Cox that while one could not transpose one`s experience to another place, "the intelligent inter-dependence which we chose has repaid itself handsomely in a new self-confidence and a new self-awareness in a country with a strong sense of continuity in its own identity".

"Our culture, even our traditional culture, our music and language are in a healthier state today than they were in the era of stagnation and depression which preceded this moment."

Mr Cox said another similarity between Ireland and Malta was that both were Roman Catholic.

There had been people who had told the Irish that the EU would impose its values on them.

But, Mr Cox asked:

"Do we have divorce in Ireland.
"Yes we do.
"How did we get it?
"Through a series of Irish constitutional referenda.
"Who chose?
"The people of Ireland.
"What was the role of the European Union?
"Zero."
"Do we have abortion in the Republic of Ireland?
"The answer is no.
"How have we chosen"
"We have had three referenda so far on this question, and the answer remained no.
"Who chose?
"The Irish people.

He said the role of the European Union was "zero" because the European Union had no competence in its treaties to interfere in those things.

"That was our business. The rest of the world, the rest of Europe, may look on and say this is odd, backward, but it is not their business. We are Irish, our identity, our values, our rights, our capacity to assert what they should be."

Mr Cox said the world had change dramatically since the collapse of communism, and the old notion of power blocs had been radically transformed.

"My country is militarily neutral and non-aligned. There is a sensitive debate in my country about this question, still. But I want to tell you that in all the years we have been in the European Union, no single Irish troop ever served on a foreign mission, UN, European or otherwise, without the consent and approval of the Irish government and the Irish parliament. No one in Brussels has had any authority to send one person on one mission anywhere, anytime."

Still, Mr Cox said, he was a supporter in the debate for the steps happening in Europe. He recalled that he was a member of the European Parliament in 1995 at a session in Strasbourg when Sebrenica fell, and he could not allow himself to take part in the debate that week to send another useless resolution as they faced the slaughter of thousands of innocent people. He was therefore proud that the European Union had learnt some lessons and in Macedonia it had contributed in a different way, by resolution, by being there, and by being willing to be active partners on the ground to achieve success.

Mr Cox referred briefly to the Irish people`s rejection of the Nice Treaty at a referendum. He was proud, he said, to have come from a country which did not consist of submissive subjects, and it was now the duty of the politicians to negotiate all the details of the treaty and connect it to the calculus of public consent.

The debate in Malta (on EU membership) was just as healthy, and a healthy ingredient to an open, democratic process.

Mr Cox praised Malta for what has been achieved so far in the membership negotiations.

He said that in a comparative analysis, what Malta had managed to negotiate with regard to the free movement of workers was "unique and unparalleled" among the negotiations by states.

"On the question of secondary residences, no other state has negotiated a similar clause anywhere in Europe. None.

"On the question of language, I am extremely pleased that the union recognises and celebrates your identity by the willingness to treat as an official and working language of the Union, your language, Malti.

"We will never successfully build a European integration process if it should be built at the price of not celebrating the very diversity from whence we come."

Much had been done in the negotiations, and much remained to be done by year`s end, Mr Cox said, but in the end it was the choice of the Maltese, not the EU`s.

"There is no external diktat. You in the reflective wisdom of your own debate will call the judgment and no one shall call it for you."

Quoting from former US President Roosevelt, Mr Cox said there was nothing to fear but fear itself.

Concluding, he said:

"The choice is yours, not mine, our door is open, our hearts are open to you, you have a long, complex and wonderful history of survival. I believe, but my belief is still not your choice, that is your privilege, but I believe you can thrive in that context. And I would say to you personally, I really think you should seize the moment, but the choice to seize it or not is yours."