PN knows it is cornered - Sant

Labour leader Alfred Sant said yesterday the Nationalist Party's 11th hour decision on Saturday to withdraw four of its candidates for the local elections in Zejtun and Marsa proved the party knew it was cornered.

The party withdrew two of its candidates for the Zejtun election and two for Marsa. As a result the number of candidates now equals the number of vacant posts and thus no election will be held. Labour will now have an 8-1 majority in Zejtun, an increase of one, while the Labour majority at Marsa remains unchanged at 5-2.

Dr Sant said the PN had shown itself to be a chicken and incapable of facing the people. "Indeed, the PN should withdraw from everywhere, including the government, and let us run the country. We are ready for it," Dr Sant said.

The MLP's spokesman on local councils, Chris Cardona, said the PN's decision was undemocratic.

Zejtun and Marsa were two Labour strongholds and the decision, he said, was taken solely so that the majority Labour would win next month would not look so large.

In the 2002 elections in the same localities as those which will be contested on March 12, the MLP obtained a 52 per cent majority. Excluding Marsa and Zejtun, the MLP would have obtained a 48.5 per cent share of the vote. Both Dr Sant and Dr Cardona were speaking in Mgarr, Gozo at the start of the electoral campaign for the local council elections.

Dr Sant said the MLP was working in the interest of the country and was intent on keeping close to the people. The government's problem, he said, was that it promised the people heaven on earth and could not deliver on its promises.

The MLP, he added, was keeping itself close to the people and ensuring it would make a difference even at the local level.

"We will continue to say the truth. We will not deceive the people. People everywhere are complaining that the government has taken them for a ride, not just on a national but also on a local level."

Because the government had hidden the country's problems, the people were suffering unemployment, a rising cost of living and an uncertain future.

Dr Sant said the Nationalist media did not say the truth when it claimed that Labour had intended to remove workers' bonuses. Indeed, that proposal had featured in the pensions White Paper issued by the present government in November.

On Gozo, he underscored the need for the island to be treated as a region. He said that during the weekend, many Maltese had crossed over to Gozo for carnival but the MLP wanted domestic tourism all year round and not just at carnival time.

Turning to local councils, Dr Sant said the MLP had a majority at Xewkija, where the council managed to eliminate a debt of Lm45,000 inherited from a PN mayor. It also set up a new public library, a day care centre, and, in spite of fewer funds, resurfaced a number of roads.

Labour MP Anton Refalo said that although the government was saying it had reduced Gozo Channel's debts to just Lm24,000, it was not saying that Lm200,000 worth of workers' national insurance contributions and FSS remained unpaid.