I need everyone to listen very carefully to what I’m about to say. The message is vital and must come through with urgency.
About a month ago, I tried to push this message in a less direct manner. Since it seems like I’ve not managed to get through, I must try at least once more.
People are clamouring for leadership in this moment of crisis. The ruling party is busy fighting shadows within its own household, the opposition is limiting itself to stating the obvious and hoping it’ll be enough to sway the electorate, and all other political options are far from viable at this stage.
This scenario emerges clearly when one looks at public discourse about ongoing affairs. Go to the comments section of every local news story that refers to governance and I can almost guarantee you will find dissent. You will find comments expressing something along the lines of ‘the people who are in charge of this country are incompetent and they need to resign.’ You will find regular calls for protests and demonstrations linked with such observations about the state of our nation.
To be clear, I am not drawing this conclusion based solely on online discourse. Bear in mind that, in my line of work, it is my duty to keep my ear to the ground and talk to the right people whenever I need to be filled in on a certain aspect of my reporting. Picking up on public sentiment is easy when you know when and where to listen, though in this case, dissent is widespread across all demographics and therefore, pretty hard to miss.
We have a fertile climate for mass protests. We last saw a glimpse of that kind of collective power on 16 May, when a coalition of organisations led a demonstration shortly after disgraced former prime minister Joseph Muscat and his former associates and colleagues were formally accused of committing a laundry list of financial corruption crimes.
Since then, the Labour Party’s vice-like grip on power has continued disintegrating, and yet, we’ve had an awfully quiet summer on our side of the fence.
Given that the party in power is responsible for the country’s abysmal state of affairs and that it is evident they must be removed, I am publicly inviting all civil society groups who wish to organise such mass protests to state their case in writing on this platform, with the hopes of eliciting further discussion on this subject.
Should any group or individual wish to use this website as a means to plead their case with the public, please do so by submitting your pitch through the contact section of this website. Of course, I am not arrogant enough to assume that representatives from every single group in the country will be reading this column, so I will make it a point to formally reach out to members of the abovementioned coalition to ask for a comment on the subject of mass protests.
If you want to help, reach out to familiar faces you know in any of these groups and ask them yourselves. Offer to help and express your interest in seeing more of this kind of action happening if that’s a sentiment you share.
In the meantime, I’m taking the liberty of sharing a blueprint for the way forward. Since my time is almost entirely consumed by work related to this website and I am hardly able to participate directly in activism as much as I used to, it would be unfair of me to ask anyone to do anything without at least contributing some ideas to the discussion, so here’s my proposal.
As of publication date, there are around 19 weeks left to run out this calendar year. That is enough of a window to package this campaign’s slogans and core messages and start circulating them through every coalition member’s channels.
While the Labour administration tries to maintain a semblance of order, our institutions are faltering. Our infrastructure is falling apart, critical civil services are struggling to keep up, and law enforcement is a miserable joke that elicits no laughter.
As all this unfolds and people slowly return to their daily lives after this month’s shutdown, civil society must unite, a phalanx that citizens can safely rally behind when called upon. It must be universally agreed that the protests will not stop until prime minister Robert Abela resigns and a snap election is called by the acting prime minister appointed in his stead. Given that this would be the sole demand, there are no details to fuss about – it is a clear, unequivocal call for removal, no ifs, no buts.
While I am aware that this is far from an ideal solution to Malta’s never-ending political crisis, the reality is that the only democratic way to remove the Labour Party from power is triggering an election right after their leader is forced to publicly admit that he has completely lost control of both the government and his own party. That admission will only happen if we call for his head until it rolls. The rest of his party can figure out who their next leader/victim is going to be while the rest of us figure out who to elect instead of them.
If this scenario sounds like a desperate last stand, that’s because quite frankly, it is.
This country is on its last legs. While the conspirators and their enablers enjoy their stolen wealth, the rest of us are simmering in a vat of iniquity. The quality of life of the average person on the Maltese islands has become unquestionably worse. People are spending more to live less. There is no balance, only stumbling from one fit of anger and despair to the next.
The situation is untenable, and it is up to us to take decisive action.
Those who are willing to do their part are invited to step up to the plate.
Those who aren’t should make way for those who are.
Full marks for the article, I totally agree