“This enormous pressure has broken me in these last few months,” Robert Abela admitted, looking haggard, pale and distressed.
You could not help pity the man. The young, energetic, positive hero was a wreck. At one point, his voice trembling, he appeared on the verge of breaking into tears as he replied to journalists’ questions at the COVID press conference.
“No other leader could have imagined that he would have been under so much pressure,” he implored.
In a crescendo of hysteria, he launched into a tirade of self-pity and abuse. A journalist had dared to ask him: would he apologise to the nation considering that Malta had the fastest rising infection rate in the very month Abela promised would usher normality?
Abela lost it. His usually calm demeanour and measured speech were swiftly abandoned.
“I take so much pleasure watching the party you represent politicising this problem,” he snapped. “The more you try and make me lose hope, the stronger I will push forward. I will not let anybody stop me.”
The prime minister wasn’t well. He was on treatment, he announced. He should not have been at work. He could not tolerate his dizziness. He had only listened to what his deputy and public health superintendent had told him and simply announced what they prepared. The measures he proposed were not his. They were Chris Fearne’s.
So when things go wrong this time, don’t blame him. It’s not his fault. The responsibility is too much to bear. He cannot take it anymore.
He finally accepted he had made mistakes. He did not have a handbook of how to deal with the pandemic, he confided. Nobody can predict what will happen, he finally conceded. So why does he keep ruling options out?
“The consistent decision of my government since last March has been to avoid lockdown,” he insisted after a Gozo business breakfast.
His own experience has shown him how unpredictable and difficult dealing with an infectious disease can be. But, precisely because of its unpredictability, all options need to be left open.
All measures must be available and, when appropriate, used. Categorically excluding lockdown is a serious error of judgement.
As seriously flawed is his assessment of the current situation: “In the medical aspect, we are in a stable situation,” he confidently proclaimed.
As our infection rate climbs faster than any other European nation, medical and nursing staff are diverted away from their duties to deal with COVID, all elective surgery is on hold for months and more ITUs are being opened, our prime minister declares that the situation is stable.
Abela has lost it completely. His assessment of the situation could not be more detached from reality. His collapse under the pressures of his office are evidently clear for all to see on national TV. His coping strategy is to resort to abuse and mudslinging.
In the midst of a national crisis, Abela found time to use the power of his office to smear and threaten Jason Azzopardi. Azzopardi, Abela announced after his business breakfast, knows that, in a short time, he will be in serious trouble.
“A serious story will be published about him.”
As those around him keep their heads, Abela loses his and blames it on them- Kevin Cassar
But he went further. “In the coming hours, Malta and Gozo will continue to confirm that Jason Azzopardi is the most hypocritical politician in this country.”
Abela was being questioned in his role as prime minister. Faced with a national crisis of epic proportions, the prime minister’s priority is to propagate petty allegations, hyped-up “breaking stories” and a public smear campaign on a member of parliament.
The ‘serious story’ about Azzopardi turned out to be a complete let down. Azzopardi had submitted his 2018 tax return late because of his separation. Unfortunately for Abela, a late tax return has none of the shock value of a prime minister colluding with a suspected money launderer and murder mastermind, repeatedly found guilty of abusing his power and breaching the code of ethics.
Abela has used the leverage of his office to bolster his mudslinging. After his Gozo business breakfast, he accused the opposition of claiming to oppose a lockdown but “through third parties” clamour for one.
He resorted to ridiculing the leader of the opposition. “I answer all your questions and don’t escape into lifts like the leader of the opposition does.”
Abela even derided Bernard Grech for failing to tell him what steps he would take to tackle the pandemic if he were prime minister. Dr Abela, Grech is not the prime minister – you are.
Little of the mud Abela is slinging seems to be sticking. Few outside his base and media organisation, which caters to it, are taking his manufactured slanders seriously. Abela hopes that concocted scandals about his adversaries will deflect the anger about his misreading and mishandling of the current COVID crisis. They won’t.
The avalanche of sensational revelations relating to Konrad Mizzi, Keith Schembri, Chris Cardona, Edward Zammit Lewis, Rosianne Cutajar, Ian Borg, James Piscopo, Joseph Cuschieri, Marvin Gaerty, Johann Buttigieg and, of course, Joseph Muscat has numbed the nation.
A late tax return will not distract the public from its prime concern – how to emerge from the desperate situation the country faces.
As the crisis deepens, what is expected from a prime minister is not mudslinging and smear campaigns. This is no time for self-pity, weakness and wavering. Disinformation and ad hominem attacks won’t ease the pressure – it simply degrades the perpetrator. Now is not the time for dizziness (sturdamenti) and breakdowns.
As those around him keep their heads, Abela loses his and blames it on them. If the pressure is breaking him, it is time to cede control – at least of the COVID situation – to those better used and better trained to handle crises.
What’s required is strong and steady leadership, focused on the job at hand. A shaky, disoriented leader lost in petty partisanship sows only apprehension and dread.
Kevin Cassar is professor of surgery and former PN candidate.