The Nationalist Party’s leadership election was always going to be an intriguing affair. However, newcomer Adrian Delia just made the race more interesting. Kurt Sansone reports.

Adrian Delia was a political nobody until 10 weeks ago, when his name only resonated in football and legal circles.

A litigation lawyer known for his hardball approach, Dr Delia was before then the president of Birkirkara FC, renowned for his inspirational dressing room pep talks.

But the man with the gift for good oratory took the Nationalist Party by storm when he put his name in the hat for the post vacated by Simon Busuttil and started to woo councillors with his anti-establishment talk.

To some, Dr Delia’s incessant targeting of his own party’s establishment was reminiscent of what Donald Trump did to the Republican Party in the US.

Here was an outsider who came with a ‘new way’ and a message of hope for PN councillors, dazed as they were from a disastrous election result.

Leading a campaign that was by far the most vociferous and engaging with the public through social media, Dr Delia sought to distinguish his brand of politics from that of the outgoing leadership.

This he managed to do primarily by demonising “the establishment” without pinpointing the people he had in mind.

MPs Jean Pierre and Kristy Debono

Many understood them to be Dr Busuttil, the outgoing PN leader, and members of the party’s administration like its general secretary, Rosette Thake, and president Ann Fenech.

The list grew longer in time: MP Jason Azzopardi, who supported Chris Said, went as far as describing Dr Delia as a “Trojan horse”, and administrative council president Karol Aquilina called an emergency meeting after a request from a councillor to investigate the allegations of financial impropriety made against Dr Delia.

It seemed as if the louder the voices against Dr Delia grew from some in the PN’s leadership hierarchy, the stronger his support became among the party’s rank and file.

The last-minute investigation by an ethics board and the PN’s administrative council’s request for him to pull out of the race evidently strengthened Dr Delia’s hand, since it dovetailed with his anti-establishment rhetoric.

But the outsider also tapped into the anger of many within the PN when he took on blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia, vowing to end her influence – real or perceived – on the party.

The harsh criticism from the blogger, including derogatory accusations against some of his close aides, like MPs Jean Pierre and Kristy Debono, backfired. Dr Delia reiterated there was “a hidden hand” that wanted to derail his leadership bid. He never identified who that hand belonged to.

We got lost in theory… we stopped understanding what people feel

Accusations were made that he was indirectly involved as a lawyer 14 years ago in a London prostitution ring that used his client’s apartment block.

Going on the offence, he filed no fewer than five libel suits against Ms Caruana Galizia, denying any wrongdoing and defending his short answers by referring to client confidentiality.

The party councillors evidently believed him, and last Saturday, 46 per cent of them gave him the thumbs up amid scenes of jubilation unseen at PN headquarters for quite some time.

Dr Delia surrounded by the media after his victory on Saturday night.

Dr Delia’s message has not been politically deep. He remains vague when confronted on sensitive policy matters such as embryo freezing and gamete donation. His economic and social vision still has to be spelt out. But what he definitely managed to do was speak the politics of the personal.

And this is what many PN activists now believe lost them the election so badly. For four years at least, the party leadership focused on one issue: bad governance and corruption. Even Dr Delia’s leadership rivals conceded that the party’s emphasis on corruption overshadowed everything else in the last legislature.

In Dr Delia’s words, the party forgot that people also wanted to live their ordinary lives that included aspirations and concerns linked to work, hobbies and their children.

Dr Delia and his wife, Nicole Vella de Fremeaux

“We got lost in theory… we stopped understanding what people feel,” he said yesterday during a press conference at the Fleur-de-Lys PN club. It was a rejection of the Busuttil legacy, whose one rallying cry was held by many as impersonal and cut off from the daily routine of most people.

Dr Delia promised to reconnect the party to its grass roots and, as a consequence, to voters. His message was well-received by councillors.

On a more frivolous level, he would play billiards with people at the każin while waiting for one of his rallies to begin and engaged in small talk about football with journalists before the last debate. Connecting with people was his strength.

But as the high-fives, the euphoric chants of “Delia, Delia” and the congratulatory hugs subside after Saturday’s result, Dr Delia will have to take his well-oiled campaign to a wider audience.

In doing so, he will have to overcome the challenge posed by Dr Said in the September 16 vote among the party’s 22,000 members.

The Gozitan MP yesterday made it clear he has no intention of pulling out of the race.

Dr Said appropriated the anti-corruption message of the past four years, positioning himself as the candidate of continuity against Dr Delia’s ‘new way’.

Members may be more amenable to Dr Delia’s message, but just like the half-time score in football may have no bearing on the final result, he knows full well the race is far from over.