Judging from the enraged comments online, a huge swathe of the population would gladly allow this country to be invaded if it means that Malta will finally win the Eurovision Song Contest. Cries of “It’s rigged!”, “It’s politics”, as if politicising everything in this country is not a national pastime, and “What has war got to do with Eurovision” went up as soon Ukraine’s win was announced.

So much online hate when one considers that the contest was created precisely to bring Europe together through new technology, especially after one of the most devastating wars in world history.

This year’s contest was a two-finger salute to Vladimir Putin. The EBU vacillated a little about booting Russia out of the competition at the start of the war but there was no such prevarication amid the millions who voted for Ukraine. Ukraine’s victory was fast and furious, just like Putin’s ‘special operation’. Oh, wait.

If you think that I am making a fuss because they’re only diehard Eurovision fans, then I invite you to take another look at the special session of parliament when Volodymyr Zelensky was invited to address our MPs.

It’s not been a good week to be Maltese. On Europe Day, no less, we witnessed another example of cravenness in parliament. When it was announced that the embattled and brave president of Ukraine would address our parliament I had suppressed the twinge of foreboding. I berated the cynic in me to trust our political class to be on the right side of history because it had been a while.

My forced optimism was very shortlived, just like Robert Abela’s claims of humility after the general election. Trust the Speaker to get Zelensky’s name wrong but also to remind him that fence-sitting is a much vaunted, erm, national quality, because ‘neutrality’. Some have mused that, in this spirit of neutrality, the government should now ask Putin to address our parliament. But didn’t they notice? Putin was also present in the chamber.

He was present in Anġlu Farrugia’s assertion that the war in Ukraine is a “conflict”, he was present in Abela referring to the country as “the Ukraine”. How’s that for a two-fingered salute to Zelensky?

The full-throated singing from the Putin Propaganda Playbook was disgraceful. But, wait, there’s more. President George Vella, when talking about neutrality recently, also sarcastically wished Finland luck for having the temerity to apply to join NATO.

Because ‘neutrality’. I sometimes think they mean neutered.

This year’s Eurovision contest was a two-finger salute to Vladimir Putin- Alessandra Dee Crespo

What is neutrality really? Even when you are standing aside, you are taking a side. Why should this country cherish objectivity in the face of evil? Washing one’s hands of the war between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful. It is taking a side. But then how can the government claim to be neutral when it sells our citizenship to Russian oligarchs and only stops because it was forced to?

This country has stopped rising to the occasion. It is firmly in the vice of the dictatorship of mediocrity, where examples of the normalisation of a value free society are everywhere, from a mob egging on a suicidal man to jump from the bastions to people being hateful online for an entire continent’s show of solidarity in a song contest (a song contest!) to a besieged nation.

Malta was a great player on the world stage once. Not any more. Today, our political leaders are obsessed with ‘positivity’ because taking a firm stand on anything opens them up to criticism. In the process, our leaders and, by extension, the people, have lost the ability to distinguish right from wrong. And when we don’t know what is right, we stop fighting for it. And we mock those who do.

As expected, Abela, ever in ‘Arani Ma!’ mode, showboated and grandstanded on Twitter after this trainwreck in parliament as if we were not there watching and cringing in embarrassment.

There’s a sure-fire way to find out if, as a leader of a country, you are in Zelensky’s good books, prime minster. No, it’s not if he addresses the parliament of another country or posts his address on Instagram. It’s when he tags you in a tweet to thank you for your support. Did he tag you in a tweet after your disgraceful performance in parliament? No, he did not.

Last weekend, thousands of Eurovision fans in Malta pored over the leaderboard of the song contest and lamented Malta’s absence on it. Zelensky’s list of world leaders is the one that counts in the current climate. And you are nowhere on it, prime minister.

I have news for those still spitting bullets online. Malta has already won the ‘eurovision’ but this country is too myopic, too tribal to notice. When Roberta Metsola became president of the European Parliament, her winning vision for Europe was lauded and then put in firmly in motion when Ukraine was invaded by Russia. Soon after, Metsola was the first major world political figure to visit Ukraine and meet with Zelensky. Boy, did he tweet about it!

I hardly ever watch the Eurovision song contest. But next year, when it will be broadcast from free Ukraine, I will make it a point to watch it. Out of gratitude for fighting for democracy on our behalf.

Slava Ukraini!