Carnival Extended

The Malta Independent



Dom Mintoff may have been booed and jeered at the University by students too young to remember what the man did to extract this supposed independent state from the grip of fundamental clerics.` Clerics who pretended they had divine right to choose the civilian government by imposing mortal sin on any one who showed as much audacity as to read the opposition`s paper.

But he was certainly right that the referendum being held on March 8 is carnivalesque and serves as a mere extension of carnival from the prior weekend.

Let me make it amply clear. I fully agree that the issue of a Malta`s relations with the EU, in membership or in partnership, needs to be decided once and for all by a popular referendum where the simple majority will prevails. This is not however to be understood that such a referendum decision puts anybody under an obligation to agree to change the Constitution where 2/3rd`s parliamentary majority is necessary.

`he was certainly right that the referendum being held on March 8 is carnivalesque and serves as a mere extension of carnival from the prior weekend.` But the referendum that meets my expectations has to have four basic ingredients. Firstly it has to present a real choice. Whilst voting for membership is a choice, voting against is no choice at all.` The choice at this point in time ought to be whether to proceed in membership on 1st May 2004 under the terms negotiated by the government, or to open fresh negotiations to enhance the present association agreement and reach a series of other bilateral agreements, policies commonly referred to by Labour as Partnership.

Secondly, it must not be held in the heat of an election campaign but has to be held post-election when far from election heat people would be free to use their vote as they think best without risking to prejudice the electoral chances of the party they support in an election.

Thirdly,` it must be held by a government that commits itself to execute the people`s decision whatever it is,` and that has the executive term in power to effectively execute such decision.

And lastly, the arguments are to be explained plainly and serenely to the electorate with public resources being fairly apportioned to both schools of thought and where both have to explain honestly the short term impact and the long term vision. ` There is time for carnival and there is time for serious decisions to be taken which truly affect the future of our children.` They ought not` be mixed. I will save my vote for a referendum which does not tack on to canival.`

This referendum fails on all these four counts and consequently does not merit my participation therein. It does not present a real choice. It is a mere election campaign for the PN with the difference that it is financed from our tax money. The government does not have the executive authority to carry out the people`s decision and the PN general secretary had no qualms in asserting that if the people will vote against, they will just keep on bombarding public opinion and repeating the exercise until the electorate is forced to say yes, just once and then never again.

Than finally a mockery is being made of democracy the way public funds are being spent to force the electorate to vote the way the government wants it. Added to the Lm2 million `information` from MIC, the Lm200,000 worth of `advice` from the EU, we now have the charade of the Prime Minister writing personally addressed letters, written` in his official position and no doubt paid from public funds, giving a very partial view of the matter under the electorate`s consideration. Why was the other side not offered similar facilities Or are we really already working on the premise that the opposition does not exist` In that case` we have lost the prime democratic credential for joining the EU in membership which ought to invalidate the whole process.

And why is the electorate being forced to decide so early when the draft, let alone the final text, of the accession treaty has not been published in English, let alone in Maltese`

There is time for carnival and there is time for serious decisions to be taken which truly affect the future of our children.` They ought not` be mixed. I will save my vote for a referendum which does not tack on to canival.

Alfred Mifsud