As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to hold sway around the world, the stories of tragedy and heroism have had to vie with a slew of conspiracy theories. From bat soup, to a rogue military lab experiment, to 5G radiation, to pseudo-religious finger-pointing, to that perennial Maltese favourite: irregular migrants.

Any day now I am expecting some wild-eyed televangelist to claim that COVID-19 is God’s punishment to elderly promiscuous men (preferably gay), and, simultaneously, that it is all part of a plan by al-Qaeda in league with Libyan militiamen to infect Europe, kill all the Christians and over-run it with Muslim blackies. Of course it makes no sense at all. But who needs logic when fear is so much more effective?

The fear factor is multiplied exponentially when it is repeated and ‘truthified’ by the most powerful and visible man in the world, US President Donald Trump. He has just repeated the military lab allegation – one should not dignify it as ‘theory’ – in the face of World Health Organisation (WHO) official statements that COVID-19 is a naturally occurring mutation.

It is painfully obvious that Trump is doing this to divert attention from his disastrous initial non-response to the pandemic. But Trump’s defective leadership in times of crisis becomes far more dangerous when he channels and even invents potentially fatal COVID cures.

Again, he is not alone in promoting quack remedies. There is too much careless pinballing of ‘news’ on social media. Add to that the breathless reporting by the mainstream outlets of sound-bites from scientific studies that are shorn of the researchers’ careful caveats.

Only this week, one study was reported to claim that smokers may have some measure of protection against the COVID virus, and another came up with the opposite conclusion.  Some are seriously asking if smoking weed can also shield you from COVID; the evidence up to now is in the opposite direction.

My personal favourite from around the world – not, I hasten to add, for the purposes of emulation – is drinking cow urine. It has the added benefit of opening your sinuses, and probably even your bowels. If you think that’s outrageous, think about the public health implications of ‘Jesus is my vaccine’ and ‘the Torah/Bible/Koran cures COVID’.

But Trump has achieved the remarkable feat of ‘quackatorial’ bilocation. In the space of five minutes during a nationally televised news conference on COVID developments, he simultaneously sank far below and rose far above such mundane lunacies in terms of potential danger to the listening public.

Robert Abela needs to learn this humbling lesson of leadership. Many times he will walk alone, accompanied only by his conscience

With almost unlimited resources and scientific advice at his disposal, he suggested that shining a torch up where the sun don’t shine would kill the COVID-19 virus. And he followed that up with recommending research on whether drinking disinfectant could be just as effective.

No wonder his scientific advisors at the news conference didn’t know where to look. All I can say is: Mr President, try it. Just think of the ratings. The rest of us who are bored to our back teeth with Netflix reruns cannot wait to catch a glimpse of you having your gourmet cheese burger with a glass of Dettol as you sit on a torch up your Potomac.

Weeding out the public interest

Apropos weed, did you see the delightful little promo for weed smoking that Parliamentary Secretary for Equality Rosianne Cutajar made on April 20, with that salesperson’s winning smile, the smart pivoting into the camera and the pert flip of her hand right out of a prime-time infomercial?

Does this junior minister know that she is working for the government, for us, not for an advertising agency or the weed-producing lobby? I half expected her to finish with: “Smoke weed. Because you’re worth it.” 

Robert Abela’s amateurism

I have to say I was disappointed that Prime Minister Robert Abela chose the cheap and easy way out of the political mess of his own making that ensued from his decision to let desperate migrants at sea die of thirst on Easter Monday.

He seized on Repubblika’s call for police action on another incident, the alleged sabotage by AFM personnel of another migrant boat, to try on some moral outrage and self-pity, and to divert attention from the deaths at sea.

It now seems that the allegation on the AFM was untrue. But anyone with political integrity would have refrained from capitalising on this to bury the dead of Easter Monday like a cat covering its doings.

Now we get to know that the government had paid for three private fishing boats, which arrived too late on the scene, to do an illegal push-back by stealth. Neville Gafa’ has sworn that he had Office of the Prime Minister instructions to coordinate this.

But The New York Times has reported that the initiative was taken by the prime minister’s head of secretariat Clyde Caruana. The OPM denied Gafa’s involvement, although it seems he still has or had some say in relations between Malta and Libya.

Amateurish and chaotic does not even begin to describe it. The government has now leased a Captain Morgan boat for another group of migrants, so that at least they are out of danger. Why was this not done for the earlier group?

Was this the price for Abela wanting to appear strong? He has started his premiership with needless deaths to his name. He needs to learn this humbling lesson of leadership. Many times he will walk alone, accompanied only by his conscience. That will be the measure of the man and his premiership.