When apparent success or good news is the order of the day, the words are ‘I, I, I’ and ‘me’. When apparent failure or bad news is on the agenda, the words change immediately to ‘they, they, they’ and ‘them’.
This remains the pattern whether it is the US, the UK, Russia and unfortunately and unnecessarily Malta.
The ‘they’ come in infinite variety: citizens who criticise government and/or the behaviour of its politicians; the political opposition itself; NGOs and ‘unaccountable’ international organisations; China, the EU, Russia or at the moment almost everyone’s favourite – migrants.
The ‘they’ also have a very specific role and value - to divert attention and to point the finger at others when it comes to responsibility for failure or for specific actions by our political leaders. In place of accepting responsibility for such failures we are instead regaled with clichés, hypocrisies, lies and threats.
Even when blatantly wrong, incompetent or corrupt, our leaders’ default position is to claim the high moral ground, indignant that anyone should deem them accountable and to dig deeper into their own hubris. An inflated sense of self-importance is routine.
Criticism and opposition is deemed fear mongering, traitorous, hate or the agenda of ‘dark’ or uncontrollable forces undermining the state.
What we are currently witnessing across much of the world is simply moral cowardice. It is the kind of cowardice where taking a principled stand is to be avoided at all costs, because it undermines the ego, might be perceived as soft or weak or might incur the hostility or disapproval of ‘important’ interests.
This cowardice is characterised by an inability to express sympathy, empathy, solidarity or worse, humility. These values are deemed to have no place in the lexicon of the strong, resolute and determined leader.
Instead of reassuring individuals and communities (especially the weak and vulnerable), the moral coward (routinely also a bully) goes on the attack, spraying blame and attributing failure to others. Seldom does the moral coward apologise for mistakes.
This cowardice is routinely used to shore up a political following, to appeal to traditional tribalisms or to destabilise others.
Such cowardice has significant consequences for society. Not only does it fail to address a crisis or threat: it divides the community, promotes cynicism and negates individual and collective civic responsibility. In Malta’s case, it has inhibited and restricted the country’s development as a society and has stunted its much-needed flourishing.
Apart altogether from the health, economic, environmental and psychological damage to society, the worst impact is on our sense of collective well-being and security.
When mixed with the hubris and dishonesty of recent leaders, it makes for a deadly concoction. When layered in with decades of political dishonesty, criminality and manipulation, it becomes toxic and propels instability.
In such circumstances the normal functioning of democracy becomes difficult if not impossible, as does truthful communication and accountability towards citizens. One set of lies and cowardly acts begets another set, and so on.
Individual and collective cowardice was sickeningly evident in Malta during the recent testimony of senior ministers in the Daphne Caruana Galizia murder inquiry and in the silence of so, so many others. It is also on display in the verbal and mathematical gymnastics used to explain Malta’s most recent strategy and results in ‘managing’ COVID 19.
We are now almost at the point where any student of the art of how not to be a political leader might simply look to Malta for guidance. It is hard to imagine a worse cabal of cowards with which to (mis)lead a country.
But in the ebb and flow of Maltese politics, the cowardice is just another footnote almost instantly swept away in the relentless tsunami of never-ending scandals and controversies that populate Malta’s 24-hour news and social media whirls.
It is but today’s latest instalment in Malta’s gallop to the bottom.