I haven’t really been following the BWSC affair all that closely, mainly because I am really, really bored with all these wannabe-Woodsteins who infest the mediasphere trying desperately to justify their distaste with the Nationalist Party government.

You know the ones I mean, they’re the people who put comments beneath this column and my blog, accusing me of being a running-dog lackey of the avaricious ruling clique. Well, they would if their vocabulary and understanding of political thought went beyond “uff, maa, these Nationalists, they’ve been there too long, marelli” levels, but since it doesn’t, they don’t.

Poor things, they are so gagging to see the Nationalists leave power that they’ve managed to blind themselves to the singularly unpleasant realities this will bring into play. Still, that’s the essence of democracy, I suppose, that even the least among us have the right to mess things up for the rest.

But even though I haven’t been reading every tidbit that dripped from the keyboards of the assorted PN-detractors about the BWSC thing, it’s been impossible for me to ignore it completely. After all, Joseph Muscat has been riding this particular warhorse for so long, he’s practically bandy-legged – maybe that’s why he sprained his ankle at the Ball of the August Moon.

The whole thing has now regressed into something less than a warhorse, though. It’s more akin to a knackered old nag, stubbornly straining to catch up with the herd, a herd that apart from a few keen types has long decided that this race is run and gone.

First out of the gate we had the Auditor-General telling us he had found no evidence of corruption. This was greeted by Labour’s PR machine, a well-oiled but really badly manufactured contraption, with the predictable “there’s no smoke without fire” refrain, ignoring the fact the smoke was predominantly emanating from the direction of their trousers.

Running a close second, the police didn’t move (which makes my metaphor a touch weird), which I can only take to mean that they don’t think there’s anything to investigate. Perhaps they didn’t have the benefit of a neatly bound report by Labour’s deputy leader, analysing the plethora of crimes in the same way the heinous crime of vote-buying had been detailed for them. Now, pulling in at the rear, we have one of the organs of the European Union, that august institution to which everyone refers with such awe whenever some dirt is thought to have been dealt locally (everyone forgetting, naturally, that a few short years ago, the EU was the embodiment of all evil) saying there’s no case to be made against Malta.

It goes, almost, without saying, that Labour’s spinners have tried to devalue this development too, reprising the Greek Chorus chant of “let the Public Accounts Committee do its work (repeat ad nauseam)” for all the world as if this institution is some sort of oracle that has exclusivity on effective truth-seeking.

And to make sure that Don Joseph Quixote’s Rocinante has metamorphosed terminally into Sancho Panza’s Rucio, the awful stench of foreign interference is suddenly being sniffed around Mile End way. When it had become clear, apparently, that an Israeli company was not going to get the contract, they started throwing their weight around, making all manner of threats and it seems they started name-dropping quite a bit.

People are now wondering whether all this noise and agitation on the part of Labour hasn’t been the result of some cunning Israeli plot to get their own back on this piddling little government that refused to bow to their fancy.

Far be it from me to imply that Labour have been led a merry dance by the Israelis, or, even less so, that they’ve cynically participated in a hatchet-job. They have said, somewhat tersely, they weren’t and they haven’t and, anyway, the truth will WikiLeak out eventually but the fact remains that, suddenly, all those wise-cracks about smoke and fire must be starting to sound pretty cringe-making.

Labour have been running in election-mode since Joseph Muscat got himself elected their leader. It was clear even to the most unsophisticated observer that they – and he – would run out of steam way before the real electoral race starts in a couple of years’ time and the BWSC saga, now being classified as a debacle in Labour’s inner circle, is a microcosmic symptom of a more macrocosmic malaise.

Not to put too fine a point on it, Labour seems to have a great aptitude for shooting its collective mouth off but when it comes to joining facts to allegations there’s something of a resource gap.

imbocca@gmail.com

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