No Criticism Please

The Malta Independent



This government is stale.` It is six years beyond its 1996 expiry date. It is still in office, unchanged and unreformed, by the wicked` exploitation of` the weakness of the democratic system ( where one man`s will prevailed on the majority mandate)` in forcing a government with a five year programme to face an electoral test after only 22 months.

Stale products and services no longer perform effectively as when fresh. This applies to bread and meat as much as to shipping bills of lading and government systems.

Stale governments normally expose a common trait.` They become very sensitive to criticism, even the most constructive one. They no longer use reason or logic in choosing right from wrong. On the contrary their main argument becomes` that something is right or wrong because they say so and not because they can positively and objectively prove as much. ` They no longer use reason or logic in choosing right from wrong`

It normally happens after 10 years in power. History is littered with examples even if restricted to the last quarter century. Mintoff fought for democracy like no one else. He brought the universal vote, the penniless and women included, for the vote at age 18, for the right to education, housing and health services even to the least privileged, opened tertiary education to workers families and generally extracted the country from the undemocratic grip of the Church that used to justify undemocratic practices by the promise or threat of what awaits us beyond this world.

He lost two election fighting for democratic principles without giving in to the Church that imposed mortal sin on whoever voted Labour in the elections of 1962 and 1966, the ones just before and just after independence.

Yet` after 10 years in power,` in 1981, he started making his own definition of democracy rather than seeking` a gentlemanly and orderly way to give meaning to the most crucial democratic test ` the orderly alternation of power in accordance with the will of the majority. `His logic is that no one should really analyse and assess such decisions on their own merits but accept them with blind faith simply because they were taken by the Prime Minister`s cabinet`

Margaret Thatcher also presents a typical case study. After 10 years in power between 1979-1989 during which she changed the face of the British economy, she thought she could do whatever she defined as right. Against the advice of friends and foes she introduced the poll tax.` A cabinet revolt forced her to resign.

Our Prime Minsiter has been increasingly using the argument that anything which is discussed and agreed to by Cabinet must be right for the simple reasons that it was so discussed and decided.` His logic is that no one should really analyse and assess such decisions on their own merits but accept them with blind faith simply because they were taken by the Prime Minister`s cabinet.

So we should not question the manipulation of the electoral district boundaries, the loss of audit tools to check the correctness of the electoral register, the granting of presidential pardons in very dubious circumstances or the award of tens of thousand of liri from tax-payers money to colleagues and friends against government policy and without going through the checks and balances of the system.

And even when criticism comes from institutions, like the Office of the Ombudsman, whose parliamentary appointment renders them superior to the government in the democratic organigramme, the government seems to have adopted one standard reply: no criticism please, we`re the government!

Alfred Mifsud