Confusing Means and Ends

The Malta Independent on Sunday



As the country gets into gear for the electoral campaigns facing it, the rising noise is increasing the confusion betweens the means and the ends of a membership/partnership option with the EU.

Whether we go for membership or partnership is not an end in itself. The end should be sustainable improving standard of living for the citizens of these islands without prejudicing our security, our nationhood and our environment.

It is all too often however that the government has made membership in the EU as the final objective. The standard of living of the citizens has been relegated to a variable that can be compromised up to whatever level is necessary to achieve the membership objective.

`The end should be sustainable improving standard of living for the citizens of these islands without prejudicing our security, our nationhood and our environment.` Only this could explain the scare campaign which has been embarked upon personally by the Prime Minister depicting a doom scenario should the Maltese exercise their constitutional right to reject membership as negotiated by his government.

Take his recent assertion that all serious exporting companies would all close down if Malta opts out of membership. The Prime Minister was undiplomatically categorical about it. All serious exporting industry will take their factories elsewhere if we stay out of the EU.

Now this is a bland untruth. Can anyone imagine such serious companies as ST Microelectronics, Brandstatter, Baxter, Pharmamed, Denim, Dowty, De La Rue. Methode and others who kept on investing and up-grading their local outfits closing down just because we go for a free trade area with the EU rather than for full integration.` If non-membership could have compromised their continued existence here, they would not have undertaken their massive investments undertaken these last few years.

And in addressing business leaders at a breakfast meeting this week the Prime Minister again warned that if the EU referendum goes against membership,` Malta`s credibility could be shocked and credit rating agencies like Moody`s and Standard and Poor`s would downgrade Malta`s status. These are scare tactics at their best.

Moody`s and such like agencies` decisions are not based on the type of international affiliations countries enjoy. They are based on the strength of the economy, its diversity, its resilience and the quality of its economic management. Switzerland, Norway and Iceland are not EU members but still enjoy optimal ratings.

The truth is that the Prime Minister and his government have mismanaged our economy so much that it is only the promise of discipline from EU membership which is keeping international rating agencies from down-grading our status.`

`The truth is that the Prime Minister and his government have mismanaged our economy so much that it is only the promise of discipline from EU membership which is keeping international rating agencies from down-grading our status` So the sacred truth is that rating agencies could down-grade our status not because we opt-out of EU membership per se, but because the economy has been prejudiced to such a degree that international rating agencies have been forced to conclude that only external discipline could save us from our own vices brought by the money no problem culture that Fenech Adami has pedalled over the last sixteen years.

In essence the choice in front of use is as simple as that. The PN believes that this country has been compromised to such an extent that only absorption by a supra-national organisation could save our skin from self-destruction.` The MLP per contra believes still in our ability to manage our own affairs with discipline, dignity and in line with good housekeeping practices. That the country needs to stand on its own feet again economically before being capable of taking a smart decision on a permanent irreversible absorption within the EU.

And as international events unfold, credibility keeps mounting on the appropriateness of Labour`s partnership policy as being more suitable for the peculiarities of our islands.` Just think about it ` would you buy a house at its full commercial price if in parliament there is a debate going on about a development plan which would pass a highway right where this house stands.

This is just the situation regarding the neutrality provisions entrenched in the Constitution vis-`-vis EU membership. We have been assure and re-assured that EU membership would not be in conflict with our neutrality status.` To sustain this MIC spends full-page adverts informing us that CSFP (Common Foreign and Security Policy `Chapter 27) is subject to consensus and Malta would block any future developments which could create conflicts with our Constitution. They also emphasise the unilateral declaration on neutrality which the Maltese government would be allowed to append to the accession treaty.

But at the same time the European Convention has accepted France and Germany proposal that CSFP matters become subject to qualified majority rule which Malta as a member with minimum voting rights will have no chance to block. So how are we going to protect our neutrality as EU members By a worthless `as things stand today` unilateral declaration` Are not the neutrality provisions of our Constitution at least worth a formal protocol to be signed by all existing and prospective members just like the abortion protocol And as the abortion protocol is not restricted to `as things stand today` provision, why should the neutrality declaration be so restricted` Or are we joining only for today`

Alfred Mifsud