Variety is the spice of life

The way I see it, the Labour leadership race is turning into quite a piquant affair. The mixture of personalities flavouring the contest is constantly whetting our insatiable appetite to learn more about Labour's new beginning.

As Leo Brincat put it, the prospective leader will need to unify and modernise the party. The way I see it, at the moment, all aspiring candidates are on very different pages.

Michael Falzon, in spite of his roaring "olè olè" slip-up, comes across as a charismatic, reasonable, moderate leader. Although his slogan Experience And Loyalty, Together For Success smacks of plagiarism (the PN's electoral slogan: Yes, Together All Is Possible), his behaviour at the Naxxar counting hall when he "single-handedly tried to stop tempers flaring" is a sterling example of leadership skills, tolerance and respect. But will these credentials overshadow the fact that, as deputy leader, he is also partly to blame for Labour's failure at the polls? Incredibly, he still believes that Labour's campaign did not come across as too negative and that "There's no point looking back". Excuse me, but how does he think he will change Labour's direction if he is wearing blinkers?

Marie Louise Coleiro Preca is another contestant who, like her former leader, has no regrets. She claims to be "against violence wherever it comes from".

Worse still, she has expressed no remorse whatsoever over the "unfortunate and shameful incidents" in Labour's past. To the contrary, she claims that "when there was abuse of power nobody consulted the party... they just went ahead and did it".

How can she have no regrets when she was Labour's secretary general during those very dark ages? It is all well and good to state that she can be a "woman of the people", that Labour needs to be "as transparent as possible", "to rediscover its identity and its social democratic values" etc., but it is quite another story to be willing to wipe the slate clean and admit once and for all that Labour's past conduct and bad policies are simply unacceptable.

Will any of the candidates stand up and be counted please? Will any of them truly turn over a new leaf?

Making a mockery of his interview, when asked whether he has any regrets, Joe Muscat, another aspiring Labour leader, chanted that he has a few but, then again, too few to mention! Oh dear, what can I say about the "anointed one" when, according to himself, he boasts that he will be Prime Minister when he is 39 years old? God spare us from such illusions of grandeur, bordering on megalomania, might I add! If Dr Muscat sincerely thinks so highly of himself, how can he actually articulate his innermost secret thoughts out loud to the media? His self-importance reminded me of Bertrand Russell's philosophy that "the megalomaniac differs from the narcissist by the fact that he wishes to be powerful rather than charming and seeks to be feared rather than loved".

Ironically, when Dr Muscat was asked whether he would consider contesting the general election in 2002 he had replied: "Definitely not. You see, I have another theory that to stand for the general election you must be either a robber, a missionary or just plain crazy. I don't think I'm any of these.

"And I don't really like the local system where you find yourself standing against candidates who have the same ideology as you do" (Malta Today, January 6, 2002). Now, a few years down the line, he has already "mapped out a 15-year project for the party and the country, pledging to work to overhaul Labour in the next two years".

If in 2002 this budding "young, pro-European, proactive leader" was denigrating candidates left right and centre, if he has spent the last four years out of touch overseas, how has he found the time or the knowledge to prepare this 15-year project for Malta? Unbelievable!

Then we have Evarist Bartolo, who insists: "I am not a clone, I have my own style, my own mindset, my own ideas and I need to be judged on my own terms. I'm Evarist Bartolo, not Alfred Sant." He too will do it his way (again, apologies to Frank Sinatra).

A couple of years ago in one of my pieces I criticised him after "during his post-budget 2006 press conference he plummeted to a new personal level and irresponsibly called the Prime Minister a 'liar'" (The Times, November 8, 2005). Now, aiming to attract the middle-class voters, he wants Labour to be "the party of the upwardlymobile in which a big part of the middle class should feel comfortable with the MLP"; otherwise, he feels, Labour "is doomed to remain a tribal minority".

He claims that even "the other deputy leader should resign" (referring to Dr Falzon who had beaten him to the post of deputy leader) and has confirmed what I have been repeatedly suggesting that "there was over-confidence and complacency that we were going to win" and that within the Labour Party there is "too much in-fighting, too much biting each other's tails".

And now for the pièce de resistance: the seasoned George Abela who publicly protested against Labour's vigilance and disciplinary board's diktat to muzzle its candidates, adding more zing to the leadership race. He was the first to propose a zesty change in the voting procedures, explaining that "it should be up to the party's paid-up members - and not general secretary Jason Micallef - to decide how and when the election for the party's top post is held".

Although Dr Abela is the only peppy "outsider" who cannot be blamed for Labour's 10-year losing streak, "this affable and smart-looking lawyer" has been heavily criticised by Mr Micallef for having unceremoniously quit his post (in the Winning Team triumvirate) before the early general election in 1998.

Dr Abela is dead set on transforming his party into an allinclusive body and, apart from luring dissenters back into the Labour brotherhood, it is highly likely that his credibility will also end up attracting the young "new" floating voters into the moribund Labour fold.

Who will actually reach the finish line first is anybody's guess but, in the meantime, let's all sit back and enjoy this delightful chain of events and breathtaking adventure.