Dawn or Doom

30^th May 2008

The Malta Independent – Friday Wisdom

The report authored by the special commission tasked to prepare a critical analysis of what led to Labour’s third successive election defeat makes painful reading.

It is mostly a collection of contributory factors for the defeat without much analysis to distinguish between cause and effect. Still it is bold and deserves credit for pulling very few punches.

The publication is in stark contrast with the way things were done following the defeat of 2003. In fact the ways things were done in 2003 probably represents the single most important contributor to the defeat of 2008, even if the 2008 report does not go as far as saying it so explicitly.

Following the defeat in the election of 12 April 2003 Labour quickly proceeded to hold the election for its leader on 15 May 2003. The special commission appointed to report on the 2003 election defeat had then not even started working on its task.

The quick leader’s election in 2003 was decided at a time when the incumbent had announced his intention not to re-contest. The general thinking was that once the leader was retiring, detailed analysis of the defeat could wait until the voting in of a new leader who would then decide upon the recommendations of the special commission. When Alfred Sant decided to change his position and announced on 1 May 2003 his intention to re-contest leadership, this logic of the calendar of events was nullified.

Because I complained loudly about the re-election of the incumbent leader before the analysis report had even started, I was officially disciplined by the party’s board of vigilance, following which I just resigned. This board of vigilance was supposed to guard against abuse of the power of incumbency rather sanction those forthright enough to complain against such abuse.

The special commission 2008 report states clearly “(lack of code of ethics) led to people being disciplined unnecessarily while others were allowed (with impunity) to impose their will on the party.”

Furthermore in confirmation of the validity of my criticism, which led to my being unfairly disciplined, the special commission 2008 report says “The defeat of 2003 and the confirmation of Alfred Sant as party leader created an ambience of antipathy towards the leader. In time this developed the organisational context as one full of suspicions and paranoia. Internal piques between rival cliques threw the party’s overall vision out of focus...”

The 2008 special commission report goes further in one of the few instances where it gives a word of advice to the incoming leader, beyond policy issues. It counsels that “The new leader... has to be tough with those who think that they own the party, or even worse, those who think that the party is indebted to them. The party has to cleanse itself from such infantile cliques before its professions of inclusiveness can be taken seriously.”

Hard words indeed! But it hurts to see the glorious Labour Party humiliated so much in public. Unfortunately this is the legacy being left by 16 years of Alfred Sant’s leadership. A legacy of catastrophic election losses, unsustainable policies leading to colossal U-turns that chip away credibility, internal financial ruin and cliques opposing each other rather than their political adversary.

Labour has developed a habit of doing the right thing at the wrong time. They should have published the 2003 report when the incumbent leader sought confirmation. Not only did they not do this, but they glaringly ignored most of the recommendations made in that report. Now that the leader has irrevocably resigned, the need to publish this detailed and damning 2008 report was much less evident. Only Michael Falzon’s contesting the leadership seems to justify its publication. The party’s interests would have been served much better by his not contesting leadership. The 2008 special commission report would have survived only for internal consumption, at least until the new leader decides whether or not the party’s best interest would be best served by publication. In the face of the fact that the outgoing leadership trio would have all resigned, Labour could have been spared this humiliation.

This could well be Labour’s darkest hour before a new dawn.

If the delegates use their minds and engage with the views of the general electorate (as re-confirmed by the findings of The Malta Independent on Sunday survey last Sunday) then George Abela should be their automatic choice.

Clearly he is the candidate most evidently free of connections with internal cliques and the one who carries the moral authority and the leadership skills needed to re-build the organisation into shape to offer a real challenge to Gonzi by 2013.

If instead the delegates continue to decide in total disengagement with the views of the general electorate, then they would be sowing as of now the seeds for the next defeat just as the seeds of the 2008 defeat were sowed in 2003.

Labour has a clear choice between dawn or doom.

Breaking Monopolies

23^rd May 2008
The Malta Independent - Friday Wisdom

Why is it possible for Malta International Airport to increase the parking charges to car-hire firms by 2300 per cent? How is it that taxi cabs spend most of their day waiting for business rather than actually driving clients around , but yet thrive as evidenced by the premium charged for transfer of licences? Why do banks often give their clients take it or leave it terms for their service?

The answer to all these questions is that we have too many segments in our economy where there is no real and fair competition. MIA is the most glaring. It is a privatised monopoly against all conventional economic wisdom.

Taxi operators remain a closed shop who prefer high prices to high business volume. Banks are the closest thing to a local cartel where operators pretend to compete but in reality they merely go through the motions while two large players continue to dominate the market and use all tricks in the book to maintain the status quo.

The economy desperately needs to be liberated from the stranglehold of such monopolies in order to preserve and enhance competitiveness. Monopolies increase expenses, reduce efficiencies and cost the country dearly in missed opportunities.

Take the sharp increase in parking fees by the airport operator to local car-hire firms. Somehow such an explosion in the operators’ costs will translate in higher car-hire fees charged to tourists who already contribute well the MIA’s ordinary revenues. Clearly something is wrong when a price goes up by 2300 per cent. Either the previous price was substantially subsidised, or the increased price is an exaggeration resulting from monopolistic powers, or both.

This shows the need for prices to be allowed to reflect market forces by elimination of unnecessary subsidies as well as by the control of monopolies in order to get prices fixed by the interplay of efficient supply and economic demand. Monopolies and undue subsidies lead respectively to inefficient supply and uneconomic and wasteful demand.

What is equally worrying is that our trait for tolerance of monopolies is being ingrained in the political sector. Following the last election results we have a PN which seem to have monopolised the government and an MLP which seem to have monopolised the opposition. It is arguable whether PN have monopolised the seats of government because MLP chose to monopolise the seats of opposition or vice-versa. I maintain that the former is more likely.

Labour almost deliberately chose to hand over government to the PN in the last three elections. They did it in 1998 by going for early elections without exploring other less drastic solutions. They did it in 2003 by forcing the electorate to vote against it when it made Labour government and EU membership mutually exclusive. And it did it again in 2008 by trying to force on the electorate a Prime Minister devoid of credibility. In all three instances the electorate would have chosen Labour in government if Labour were ably led. If the PN are monopolising the seats of government it is with courtesy of Labour.

What is doubtful is whether Labour have got so used to being in opposition that they really have lost the urge of winning government. So far we have had conflicting signals. The way the delegates defended their right to elect the leader and denied ordinary members the right for direct participation shows diabolical persistence in error.

Having been responsible for choice of the leader who led the party to three successive defeats and knowing how critical the choice of the leader is for electoral success or failure, delegates should have had a tinge of humility about their ability to elect a prime minister rather than merely a party leader.

On the positive side the decision to publish the full report of analysis regarding the last election defeat and to make it widely available to the conference delegates in good time before the leadership election, shows that there is still inner will to get unglued from its pitiful situation since opting for early election nearly 10 years ago. This optimism assumes the report will be published in its original format, in full and without censorship or editing.

While five contestants are in the contest, research among the general electorate shows basically that it is a two-horse race between Abela and Muscat. Research conducted by Media Today among a sample of conference delegates shows the same two favourites but with inverted rankings. These surveys carry a wide margin of error and the Media Today survey has been faulted for being selective in the choice of the sample (in reality when the base is as small as 900 it is more realistic to conduct a full survey rather than a sample) but they are still fairly indicative.

They are indicative of a situation where while the general electorate prefer Abela over Muscat as the new Labour leader, the hard core Labour seem to prefer Muscat over Abela. Why this is so lends itself to many conspiracy theories of inner divisions and manipulation by those resisting internal change that prefer Muscat as the candidate with the minimalist approach to it.

Will the delegates engage with the views of the wider electorate or persist in doing it in their own way? The new leader will be elected by the delegates but his success or failure will be decided by the general electorate. So the delegates have to search really deep in their conscience and decide whether they continue electing a mere party leader or do it in full engagement with the wider electorate and elect a future prime minister.

This decision will be instrumental in deciding whether the monopolies of the respective parties in government and in opposition will persist beyond 2013.

The only emerging monopoly I really would not touch is Inter’s dominance of the Seria A scudetto.

 

 
   

Proud Again to be Labour

18^th May 2008
The Malta Independent

“Opposition leader Alfred Sant yesterday (12 May 2008) warned that democracy in Malta was facing a new threat, claiming that a clique which was not at the forefront of the political scene had the power to take decisions in their own interest.

“He warned that these people would try to take over the Labour Party and colonise it. But he believed in the internal strength of the MLP and that it would bear witness to its commitment to real democracy and would never play servant to just a few interests.”

I am still trying to decode this message. I hate it when politicians speak in riddles. Can’t they please speak in plain and simple language? Any threat to democracy is a matter of public interest, so the Leader of the Opposition has an obligation to warn about it in the clearest possible language and to name and shame without fear or favour.

But, try as I may, even forcing myself into the most generous and objective mode possible, I can’t avoid the conclusion that in reality the decoded message is:

The government is a puppet to commercial interests.

These same commercial interests could be working a plan to infiltrate Labour as it goes about electing a new leadership.

However, provided that Labour preserves its internal status quo, as it ably did at the extraordinary general conference of 9 May 2008, then one can rest assured that under the leadership favoured by those who defend the status quo, Labour will not be colonised by such hidden interests that already control the PN.

The accusation that government is a puppet to commercial interests is disrespectful of the general electorate who, in a democratic manner, has elected the same government three times in a row. This is not to say that certain safeguards are not needed to avoid risks of undue influence from business lobbies. Chief amongst these is a transparent mechanism for party funding. I have, in the past, expressed the view that this should exclude business donations altogether. Political parties are crucial for the execution of democracy and they should be funded by the state, with adequate controls to ensure that political parties remain responsible to the general electorate and not to narrow interest groups.

Claims that these commercial interests are about to infiltrate Labour is a very serious matter. But in reality, have they not already done so? The pitiful state of party financing, and the lack of political will to force the government to put party financing at the forefront of the political agenda, means that the party regularly goes cap in hand demanding “donations” from commercial organisations. It is not simply a case of “il ftit minghand il hafna” as I did in the 1992-96 period for the funding of the CNL project.

However, the most debatable is the third argument, that the status quo gives Labour the inner strength to avoid becoming a colony of “just a few interests”. Labour’s raison d’être is to be in government in order to implement its doctrine of social democracy. Eternal opposition, even if free from colonisation by narrow interests, will never permit Labour to reach its objectives. Organisations that consistently miss their objective inevitably finish on the history dump.

Furthermore, by staying eternally in opposition, Labour exposes itself much more to the risk of being dominated by narrow interest groups. Running a political party is not exactly cheap, and no-strings-attached small and widespread donations are stimulated by the achievement of success. Success brings in more no-strings-attached donations, as the Obama experience shows in the US. Serial losers will not attract the necessary volume of such donations and this makes reliance on the strings-attached variety more likely.

Strings-attached donations to serial losers are high-risk, high-return investments for the donors, who would expect a great return on their investment if the unlikely were to happen.

Defending the status quo is therefore more conducive to colonisation than the prospect of change. How one can argue conversely is not quite comprehensible, unless it is a desperate attempt to preserve one’s legacy from being branded by failure, stagnation, bankruptcy, rift and division.

This smells of patriarchal interference to impose a chosen successor: a clear attempt to protect Sant’s legacy and to protect those within Labour who are well served by it. Under Sant, Labour is already colonised by the PN. It has access to internal documentation and discussions even at the highest level. It influences the election of our leaders and executives through reverse psychology. It even decides who is to be alienated from Labour by flattering him and pitching him against the Leader. Tell me!

This is not a clash between Abela and Muscat, Falzon etc. They are all are valid contenders, if they are truly allowed to plough their field without interference. It is not a clash between those who want the delegates and those who want the members to elect the leader. It is not a clash between those who were alienated and those who swallowed their pride and stayed on.

It is a clash between those who have a legacy and private interests to preserve, even at the expense of the party continuing with its serial losses and sinking further into financial quandary, and those who are fed up of losing, fed up of seeing Labour following policies that betray its social doctrine, fed up of being considered as children of a lesser god and fed up of seeing the PN encroaching on Labour’s traditional territory as it becomes less fashionable with every new generation to be Labour.

Those resisting change have a position to defend: their earnings depend on the job they have with the Party (or its subsidiaries) or through the Party (eg full-time mayors). They want to change nothing and excel at delivering cheap oratory that warms the heart but blocks the mind. They do not even adopt the minimum of governance standards by declaring their personal interest in the preservation of the status quo.

On the contrary, those who are successful in their own private life, those who give without expecting anything in return, those who are loyal to the organisation and its principles rather than individuals, those who openly criticise because they can no longer take seeing the party suffering one humiliation after another – those are in favour of change. They want positive change, where there is space for everyone, even for those who are resisting it.

They want change that delivers success and makes Labour fashionable again with new and floating voters and with those nationalists who also believe it is time for a serious alternation of power. They want change that makes us proud again to be Labour.