2nd May 2008
The Malta Independent - Friday Wisdom
Last Sunday, the newspaper Illum
published a strictly “for your eyes only memo” dated 10 July 1998 I had sent to
then Prime Minister Alfred Sant. Given that this was a “from me to you” document
the source of its leakage as well as that of the accompanying minutes of an
internal MLP executive meeting is very narrow indeed. Does this explain why
under Sant’s leadership leakages of internal information were the order of the
day?
Coming so soon after my article ‘Joking apart’ of last week, where I criticised Sant of double speak and undue interference in the selection process for his successor, I can only conclude that when some people cannot win by arguments they try other means.
The whole thrust of my advice to Prime Minister Sant at the time was the old Roman dictum “if you want peace you have to be prepared for war”. My advice was that as survival of the then Labour government depended on Mr Mintoff’s resignation, this was more likely to be procured if the general conference gives a resounding mandate for early elections. I saw better likelihood of Mintoff consenting to a reasonable compromise once such general conference backing would have been secured.
I was also depressed at the time that George Abela did not stay to follow this strategy and I had taken badly his sudden departure from the leadership team after six years of very fruitful collaboration. Ten years and three successive election defeats later, and having tasted firsthand how Sant quashes all criticism, I am entitled to revise my 1998 judgement.
It is the sign of consistency to change one’s mind in the face of changing circumstances and I have no hesitation therefore in endorsing George Abela’s bid for leadership as in him I see the person most likely to build a majority around Labour to achieve success come next elections. In doing so I am being consistent in putting Labour’s interest foremost.
In fact it is just as well to reveal the whole advice I was giving to the Prime Minister during those turbulent days of 1997/1998. Exposing only a small part distorts the picture. While suggesting to do whatever it takes to get a resounding backing for early elections from the general conference, I was simultaneously advising to use such mandate strictly as a lever with which to negotiate Mintoff’s resignation. It is this last bit which was conveniently left out of the documents leaked.
In 1998 not enough effort was made to explore other options to preserve the mandate and render it effective without the need to call fresh pre-mature general elections. Somebody seemed to have ants in his pants to pull the early election trigger without exploring other options, as someone could not take the heat in the political kitchen. In fact in the private memo that was leaked I had stated as follows:
“As a last resort (you should) consider the boardroom solution I had proposed. It is a sure winner and will checkmate all your opponents. I reproduce graphically on attachment”.
The attachment was conveniently not leaked to the newspaper. So I have to explain what the boardroom solution was.
It started in a memo dated 25 November 1997, a copy of this memo can be found on the home page of my website. From the first hints that Mintoff’s vote in parliament could not be taken for granted I started painting alternatives to Prime Minister Sant, expounding the various strategies he could choose from. But I made it clear that the option to go for early elections was “a big gamble” and that it was not fair “that we have to re-play a game we have already won only after one year and at a point when we administered the bitter medicine”.
The last resort solution I proposed was not early elections. Certainly it was not publicly calling Mintoff a traitor, which basically put paid to all chances of calm negotiations. It was going to the opposition benches while keeping intact the election victory mandate of 1996. It was offering the PN to form a government while neutralising for them Mintoff’s parliamentary vote. This was meant to remove Mintoff’s strength in parliament and without such strength it was more likely that Mintoff would accept an honourable compromise for his resignation. The moment that Mintoff would have agreed to resign from parliament, Labour would immediately have gone back in government on the strength of the 1996 mandate.
Some would argue that the PN would not have agreed to form such a government. Who knows? If we tried we would have known and in the process we would have sent a further message to Mintoff that it was in his interest to negotiate an honourable resignation. Even if in the worst circumstances this so called “boardroom solution” proved ineffective at least one could say that we would have tried all that was conceivable before rushing to the drastic and irreversible solution of early elections.
When I wrote what I wrote on 10 July 1998 I was more than convinced that Sant would not go for early elections and that he would use the general conference mandate as leverage to negotiate Mintoff’s resignation. I was wrong. With hindsight I think Abela knew that Sant, rather than use it to negotiate with, was bent on executing it. Surely the electorate has never again trusted Sant to occupy the top post even though they preferred Labour in each and every election where Sant becoming again prime minister was not in the equation.
A revolver is often more effective when brandished in its holster rather than when actually fired killing the opponent whom you were trying to persuade over to your point of view. It is even much less effective if you use it to blow a hole in your brain as Sant did in that awful summer of 1998. Clearly Abela knew Sant better than I did in 1998 and his judgement was better than mine. It is never too late to learn as I did through first hand experience during the course of the last 10 years.
Coming so soon after my article ‘Joking apart’ of last week, where I criticised Sant of double speak and undue interference in the selection process for his successor, I can only conclude that when some people cannot win by arguments they try other means.
The whole thrust of my advice to Prime Minister Sant at the time was the old Roman dictum “if you want peace you have to be prepared for war”. My advice was that as survival of the then Labour government depended on Mr Mintoff’s resignation, this was more likely to be procured if the general conference gives a resounding mandate for early elections. I saw better likelihood of Mintoff consenting to a reasonable compromise once such general conference backing would have been secured.
I was also depressed at the time that George Abela did not stay to follow this strategy and I had taken badly his sudden departure from the leadership team after six years of very fruitful collaboration. Ten years and three successive election defeats later, and having tasted firsthand how Sant quashes all criticism, I am entitled to revise my 1998 judgement.
It is the sign of consistency to change one’s mind in the face of changing circumstances and I have no hesitation therefore in endorsing George Abela’s bid for leadership as in him I see the person most likely to build a majority around Labour to achieve success come next elections. In doing so I am being consistent in putting Labour’s interest foremost.
In fact it is just as well to reveal the whole advice I was giving to the Prime Minister during those turbulent days of 1997/1998. Exposing only a small part distorts the picture. While suggesting to do whatever it takes to get a resounding backing for early elections from the general conference, I was simultaneously advising to use such mandate strictly as a lever with which to negotiate Mintoff’s resignation. It is this last bit which was conveniently left out of the documents leaked.
In 1998 not enough effort was made to explore other options to preserve the mandate and render it effective without the need to call fresh pre-mature general elections. Somebody seemed to have ants in his pants to pull the early election trigger without exploring other options, as someone could not take the heat in the political kitchen. In fact in the private memo that was leaked I had stated as follows:
“As a last resort (you should) consider the boardroom solution I had proposed. It is a sure winner and will checkmate all your opponents. I reproduce graphically on attachment”.
The attachment was conveniently not leaked to the newspaper. So I have to explain what the boardroom solution was.
It started in a memo dated 25 November 1997, a copy of this memo can be found on the home page of my website. From the first hints that Mintoff’s vote in parliament could not be taken for granted I started painting alternatives to Prime Minister Sant, expounding the various strategies he could choose from. But I made it clear that the option to go for early elections was “a big gamble” and that it was not fair “that we have to re-play a game we have already won only after one year and at a point when we administered the bitter medicine”.
The last resort solution I proposed was not early elections. Certainly it was not publicly calling Mintoff a traitor, which basically put paid to all chances of calm negotiations. It was going to the opposition benches while keeping intact the election victory mandate of 1996. It was offering the PN to form a government while neutralising for them Mintoff’s parliamentary vote. This was meant to remove Mintoff’s strength in parliament and without such strength it was more likely that Mintoff would accept an honourable compromise for his resignation. The moment that Mintoff would have agreed to resign from parliament, Labour would immediately have gone back in government on the strength of the 1996 mandate.
Some would argue that the PN would not have agreed to form such a government. Who knows? If we tried we would have known and in the process we would have sent a further message to Mintoff that it was in his interest to negotiate an honourable resignation. Even if in the worst circumstances this so called “boardroom solution” proved ineffective at least one could say that we would have tried all that was conceivable before rushing to the drastic and irreversible solution of early elections.
When I wrote what I wrote on 10 July 1998 I was more than convinced that Sant would not go for early elections and that he would use the general conference mandate as leverage to negotiate Mintoff’s resignation. I was wrong. With hindsight I think Abela knew that Sant, rather than use it to negotiate with, was bent on executing it. Surely the electorate has never again trusted Sant to occupy the top post even though they preferred Labour in each and every election where Sant becoming again prime minister was not in the equation.
A revolver is often more effective when brandished in its holster rather than when actually fired killing the opponent whom you were trying to persuade over to your point of view. It is even much less effective if you use it to blow a hole in your brain as Sant did in that awful summer of 1998. Clearly Abela knew Sant better than I did in 1998 and his judgement was better than mine. It is never too late to learn as I did through first hand experience during the course of the last 10 years.
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