The turning point

There is something more than mildly hysterical about the way the Nationalist Party leadership has decided to wreck its own European Parliament election campaign by attacking the Greens. It becomes clearer by the day that they cannot fault Arnold Cassola. By their own yardstick, he stands head and shoulders above all the candidates in this election.

There is no doubt that he is the most competent, consistent and credible contender for the post of MEP. The man is straight as an arrow. Nobody joins the Greens for personal reward other than the satisfaction of serving the country according to his or her lights. Arnold was a co-founder of the Green Party in Malta 15 years ago, co-founder of the European Federation of Green Parties and he is today secretary general of the transnational European Green Party.

Time and again he has been able to get the government to pull up its socks in dealing with the EU: on the Maltese language question, on emergency funding after last year's rains, on lower rates of tax for labour intensive economic sectors. He has been able to provide key contacts during the accession negotiations. He was there to provide the Maltese government with information and contacts when Malta's membership application was to be pulled out of the freezer in 1998.

Perhaps he was luckier than the other candidates. He was in the right place at the right time to build up a wealth of experience they inevitably lack. Perhaps it is more than luck. He has withstood the propaganda barrages of four national elections. He is not trying his hand at politics for the first time.

Nor has he had the audacity to try his luck for the first time at the deep end of international politics. Having held the post of secretary general of the European Federation of Green Parties for four years, he is no novice at European politics. No novice would be chosen for the post, no greenhorn would be reconfirmed unanimously at the end of his first term by the 32 member parties. Arnold Cassola is Malta's only certified export quality politician.

It must be intensely frustrating for the designers of the PN election campaign. Everything they say points out the best contender - in another party: the Greens. Criticising Labour for having been anti-EU does not work against the Greens. Everybody knows that without the splendid self-sacrifice of the Greens in 2003, the dream of EU membership for Malta would never have been realised. How do you viciously attack a candidate to whom you owe so much without becoming despicable to anybody with the slightest sense of fairness?

The answer is that you do not. And, yet, it has not prevented the most extraordinary and counter-productive political assault ever attempted by the PN. Some propaganda genius must have calculated that it does not harm the PN to certify itself as the most monumentally ungrateful institution ever to have set foot on Malta's political stage. It is a matter of over-reliance on the undemocratic propaganda machinery which the other two parties have cornered for themselves.

Both the PN and the MLP believe they can create any reality they like by repeating a stupidity a million times on television. They truly believe it is possible to seem heroic while being dastardly. Some advertising wizard must have persuaded them that if you say "values" and "principles" often enough you will appear to have acquired them. They should stick to selling soap.

It does very little for PN competence. Attacking the Greens gives them zero in consistency and less for credibility. The smear campaign about abortion was disgusting. It backfired badly when the Maltese Greens were able to display their steadfast opposition to abortion. Next came the garbage about eco-taxes. It was ludicrous.

The European Greens have long pointed out the environmental impact of tourism. What it means to Malta is nothing at all. Since a gnat bite tax on aviation fuel would be applied across the board it does not give an iota of advantage to any competing destination. Malta would not lose a single tourist.

The taxes on tourism imposed by the Nationalist government since 1995 are no laughing matter. Airport taxes, taxes on restaurants, licence fees on operators, contributions to the Malta Tourism Authority and a loss in revenue to travel agents through compression of their agency fees are all very real. Ask the tourism sector. Their real and present burden is not a remotely possible, across-the-board gnat bite. It is a new and harrowing burden on Malta's key economic sector. Just to add to the fun the PN saves money by taking Lm850,000 per annum from the MTA budget.

Even before the hypocrisy over eco-taxes died a natural death, the PN government shoots itself in the head by introducing an eco-tax on plastic packaging. Credible? Consistent? Competent? What brilliant timing! Please be assured there is no secret conspiracy between the Greens and PN propaganda gurus. They do it all on their own.

The latest bit of nonsense is that the Greens are allied with Labour. I just love it. It is the conspiracy theory to end all conspiracy theories. After 20 years out in the cold Labour cannot contemplate the emergence of a third party that could prevent it governing all alone any time in the future. They would like to slit our throat just as much as the PN leadership does. Does anybody doubt it?

The MLP are a political dinosaur to match the Jurassic exhibit which is the PN. Our only alliance is with the Maltese electorate. Both the other parties dread the emergence of the Greens because it would also usher in an era of consensus politics for which they are simply not prepared.

It is what Malta needs and what the Maltese crave. It is what the PN and MLP leadership fear most: the end of zero sum politics.

The 2004 European Parliament elections campaign will go down in history as a political turning point. For one reason or another the Maltese have been obliged to close their eyes and vote perpetuating a political confrontation that has cost them more than most of us care to calculate, probably more than the Lm100 million per year loss that has made our budget deficit mushroom out of control.

The extravagance of eternal political carnivals will be paid in inevitable taxation and a myriad opportunity costs in the years to come. It is time to cut our losses with the politics of the past.

Only the Greens can make it happen. Only one candidate in this election can offer the country a chance of change. It is a huge historical responsibility for just one man. Arnold Cassola can bear it with dignity and sober confidence. Never more than today have I admired and respected him. He responds to untruths and propaganda with facts and figures.

He never responds to mudslinging by mudslinging. He takes whatever our rivals can throw at him and keeps smiling. The worse it gets, the closer we all are to a political turning point which will make political carnivals like this utterly unacceptable to any Maltese electorate. It is not a fabricated vision but a reality already within our grasp.

Dr Vassallo is chairman of Alternattiva Demokratika - The Green Party.