The road to Damascus

In October 2004 the Malta Labour Party, fully aware of the fact that the problems brought about by irregular immigration were destined to accentuate, held a press conference at Mile End to make a genuine appeal to the government to deal with immigration in a more holistic and effective way through the organisation of a national conference.

You will not have already forgotten that the MLP was ridiculed and criticised by the Nationalist Party for daring to make such a "hopeless" proposition. The Deputy Prime Minister, Tonio Borg, did not spare himself enough time to digest the idea and quickly dismissed it by means of a press statement issued on October 10, 2004.

He wrote that "it is a totally mistaken strategy on the part of the opposition to attack the government in a most disloyal way instead of backing it in fighting and controlling the problems of illegal immigration... the Leader of the Opposition has once more engaged himself in a senseless and illogical public relations campaign... all this demonstrates that the opposition has no clear ideas of what is the national interest and all it is trying to do is to take cheap political mileage out of this human tragedy". He also went as far as to say that "illegal immigration must be countered in a coherent way, through a long term strategy that safeguards the interests of the country and not of a political party".

Victor Scerri, president of the PN's general council, did not mince words on Brian Hansford's Realtà talkshow on Smash TV. He said that the country "does not need national conferences as an excuse for a good business lunch. It is the Labour Party that needs to organise a general conference to iron out a policy on immigration!"

The government was in full partisan mode and clearly reluctant to take on board any suggestion of consensus from the opposition. On the contrary it showed it preferred to carry on dealing with the problem on its own because of its obsession that its style of governance is inspired by divine intercession. The government did not even bother to consider the idea of a national conference as part of the "long term strategy" it contemplated in its own press statement. This was its greatest mistake.

By time, Dr Borg et al warmed up to the idea and gauged public opinion and sentiments expressed in the independent print media in favour of a national conference. By the end of January 2005 the government made the quickest and most important u-turn in its political history by making its own the idea of a national conference, brushed aside criticism that it was ever against such an initiative in principle and indeed ended up chairing the meeting much to the satisfaction of the opposition.

Compare the negative and aggressive tone in the Deputy Prime Minister's press statement of October 2004 with the remarkable friendliness expressed by himself in his introductory speech at the conference this January: "I would like to thank you for accepting our invitation to attend and participate in this national conference on irregular immigration". But this was not the end of the U-turn.

In the wake of the new crises this summer, as boatloads of immigrants keep reaching our shores, the government has just declared it intended setting up a mechanism by virtue of which the administration of immigration issues will fall neatly under one clear chain of command, independent of the Commissioner of Police and the Brigadier of the Armed Forces. This is meant to bring proper and real organisation to the human and technical resources of the country dealing with the problem. But it also represents a clear and radical departure from the present state of affairs under the dual and concurrent management of the police and the armed forces, which clearly led to rampant disorganisation and frustration.

In revealing its plans, the government did not even have the decency to admit that the blueprint was meticulously outlined by none other than Martin Scicluna in the report he was commissioned to prepare and submit to the national conference on immigration earlier on this year. Indeed, his report to the conference served as a basis for discussion at subsequent task force meetings between the government, the opposition and NGOs and was the inspiration and force behind another, slightly modified, report prepared under over own signature to an inter-ministerial committee this time as the government's own consultant. Now he is also the government's envoy on immigration.

It is patently obvious that unless the national conference was held we would never have had a Scicluna report to lead us in the first place let alone a government policy proclaiming the immediate establishment of one clear chain of command in immigration issues.

I would not like to shoot down the government's policy document on immigration published on the eve of the national conference, which contains some valid points. But the first fundamental and radical change that is destined to happen sooner rather than later is missing in the government's policy document. A couple of months ago the government had no plan whatsoever in mind to establish a unit with a clear chain of command. Which goes a long way to explain the importance of last January's national conference which the opposition had tirelessly worked for.

It would be unrealistic to expect the MLP to remain silent on this remarkable political somersault. For posterity's sake, I wish to emphasise that the national conference was not my own but Alfred Sant's vision. To all his adversaries I say I am very pleased it has come to fruition. His patience was rewarded and his politics on immigration were vindicated by the government itself.

Dr Gulia, MP, is shadow minister for home affairs and the armed forces.