Our sovereign state

Last Saturday, The Times dedicated half of its front page to a photo of Fort St Angelo floodlit by a new lighting system that was inaugurated the previous night - a worthy initiative of the Cottonera Rehabilitation Project. Fort St Angelo will figure prominently in the celebrations of Malta's entry in the EU on the night between April 30 and May 1, celebrations that will be among those followed by millions of televiewers across Europe.

I find all this quite ironic! Ironic because the short-lived 1996-1998 Labour administration was prepared to cede our sovereignty on Fort St Angelo to the Order of the Knights Hospitalliers of St John - a preposterous unprecedented act in Malta's history. Ironic because it was the same MLP that opposed Malta's EU membership for various ill-begotten reasons among which the ludicrous claim that EU membership meant the loss of our hard-won sovereignty!

EU membership does involve the sharing of some aspects of our sovereignty with the other 24 sovereign states but this will, in fact, enhance our sovereignty as it will be able to assume a dimension that was hitherto unattainable simply because of the limitations of our small size. Malta sharing some aspects of its sovereignty with the likes of Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom is no joking matter, even though Wenzu Mintoff - an MLP candidate for the European parliament elections - thinks that seeing Maltese parliamentary secretaries on the same table with other European ministers is something to be laughed at!

The real reason why some elements in the MLP cannot yet accept our membership of the EU is that they have not managed to get their mindset out of the empire-colony mode. They are stuck in the past and so conclude that Malta is losing its independence and becoming a colony once again because they cannot imagine a different relationship between Malta and the other member states of the European Union.

To be fair, one must also acknowledge that there are MLP devotees who look at this issue differently. MLP international secretary Joe Mifsud, for example, is on record acknowledging that our sovereignty is not going to be lost but it is going to be shared and, therefore, we should not be afraid of showing our disagreement when the situation calls for such a stance.

Fort St Angelo, of course, predates the HMS St Angelo days in the heyday of the British Empire. It was there defending Christianity in the Great Siege of 1565 when the foreign "owner" of Malta was the Order of the Knights of St John that had, in fact, constructed it. Yet, this fact could never justify the notion that we should consider ceding our sovereignty on the fort - however small the area and however romantic this idea could have been.

Many people had thought it strange that one of the very first acts of the Borg Olivier government after we attained independence in 1964 was to establish formal diplomatic relations between the new sovereign state of Malta and the sovereign Order of the Knights.

But this development - sought with somewhat uncharacteristic zeal - was tantamount to a tacit acknowledgment by the Order of the Knights that it had no claims against the newly independent state, whatever had happened in the past.

True to their tradition, the MLP take eons to understand such subtle concepts and therefore do not stop short of daring to upset a state of affairs that they are boorishly unaware of!

On the other hand, the Nationalist Party prides itself of always having been on the correct side of history. It looks forward with eagerness at the opportunities that in a few days' time will be available to Malta and its people as part of the European Union - the first time in history that the peoples of Europe have come together peacefully of their own free will and without being coerced to do so.

At the same time, it has every right to take a fleeting glance with pride at what it has achieved for Malta in the past.

Mr Falzon, a former minister, is a PN candidate for the European parliament elections.

micfal@maltanet.net