Three summers ago, in 2019, three apartment blocks would crumble as a result of construction works nearby. Families in Pietà, Gwardamangia and Mellieħa would end up homeless, at the mercy of unscrupulous developers and their sleazy lackeys in power.
The ‘accidents’ would spark the 7 ta’ Settembru protest, led by Moviment Graffitti and endorsed by 80 civil society groups, in what was the biggest and most recent manifestation of popular anger not only at the construction lobby, but at the situation in planning, the environment and open spaces, among others.
Then-Planning Minister Ian Borg sought to muddy the waters by claiming that the demonstration was aimed at the infamous 2006 Local Plans; a partial lie, of course, since he had no issue tweaking them years after their unfortunate birth.
Simultaneously, the exponents of another crumbling house took umbrage at the activists’ public rejection of their presence in this protest. Some of the PN brass were incensed at having been “snubbed” by what was essentially a civil society movement offering a safe space for citizens, away from partisan interference; this also meant keeping out the people who wrote those horrific planning regulations.
A news portal (edited by a former environmental activist, later PN strategist) tried to brand the rally as an “anti-government” one. After Graffitti rejected this narrative, all of three articles tried to scorn the group’s uncompromising independence.
The least forgettable of the trio, published in this newspaper, was penned by an ex-consultant to Lawrence Gonzi, involving a convoluted logic about “whisky priests” to imply that the protestors’ neutrality was a naïve play for the gallery.
Three years later, the PN is still in opposition despite the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia, widespread corruption, environmental destruction, disastrous roadbuilding policies, speculation, and general lawlessness: issues in which activist groups are involved every day, while the opposition chooses a vow of silence.
The last elections saw the PN lose another 12,000 votes since 2017, notwithstanding a less-than-inspiring PL campaign and nine years of rowdy government (Labour would ‘only’ lose 8,000 voters).
The noises from the ostentatious ruin that is the Dar Centrali blamed the “power of the incumbent” and the “Ġaħan”.
You’d expect a party reeling from three consecutive drubbings to kickstart a period of humble introspection: but besides the snooty blame-shifting came more resignations, purges, infighting, and sordid stories of fat cats calling the shots.
The PN’s handling of the Albert Buttigieg debacle reveals, along with its electoral campaign, how the opposition has absolutely no interest in challenging the construction lobby and its unfettered power.
More so with the likes of Ray Bezzina as one of Bernard Grech’s Four Horsemen: the former George Pullicino aide, who has since resigned, was in the same corridors of power when the 2006 Local Plans and their secretive annexes were drafted.
No surprise, then, that the Nationalist Party isn’t remotely interested in reviewing these disastrous planning policies; instead they repeated Labour’s line that a change of these plans would result in government having to pay compensation.
It’s become boring, even to the diehard Labourite, to see an opposition running blindfolded in a minefield of its own making- Wayne Flask
But this, too, is a lie. The European Court of Justice had thrown out a similar appeal by a Maltese developer in 2010: a legal expert was quoted as saying that “expecting the law not to change in the future is not considered a legitimate expectation under EU law”.
It beats me how a party made up almost exclusively of lawyers doesn’t know this; but there again, just like Labour, the Nationalists are willing hostages of the business class.
After Adrian Delia’s disastrous interim – one made of incompetence, inconsistencies, long knives at midnight and the ludicrous splaying of his private life – the confessionals would elect their own whisky priest. Many voters had to watch on in disbelief as Grech’s party staggered to find its footing on, for example, the Marsascala marina, lurching to the right on countless other issues, slurring about the IVF, and spilling the pints of new and old candidates.
Interestingly, even the master tactician Claudio Grech would pack up and take his momentum elsewhere, just as Marsascala started to heat up again and the names of the bidders were becoming public knowledge.
Throughout the campaign, the leadership mirrored the party’s lack of decisiveness, as they insisted on promising incentives to big business while ignoring grassroots realities.
The energy they put in fighting civil liberties such as the cannabis reform, instead of reining in the corrupt, deadly construction industry is a reminder of their muddled economic and socially conservative priorities.
It’s become boring, even to the diehard Labourite, to see an opposition running blindfolded in a minefield of its own making.
The loss of key talent throughout the years has resulted in mediocre candidates and right-wing narratives.
The party, despite its pipers’ denials, is as ideologically as it is financially bankrupt, and its weak fishing expeditions for votes see candidates dancing around the fires of anti-immigrant anger.
For the top names today are people like Joe Giglio, a lawyer with an Italian surname who makes wild calls for mass deportations; a bit like that Italian dictator whose trains, allegedly, always left on time.
Gozitan hotshot Alex Borg ousted Chris Said from the PN’s shadow cabinet but in his criticisms of the PA’s outrageous servility to Joseph Portelli, the young upstart remains unwilling to mention the developer by name.
There is nothing holding the PN together other than hatred for Labour, their stolid conservatism, and a disturbing, tone-deaf insistence on class superiority, as if they believe their blood is really blue.
But the high horses have bolted into the distance long ago.
The electorate needs a serious, consistent, upstanding alternative that focuses on our quality of life, more than its value.
Until then, if that day ever comes, civil society will continue being the opposition: the panthers, be they black, red or rainbow coloured, have no fear of them fat cats.