Alfred Sant got his election slogan from Zimbabwe
The Labour Party tried to raise some laughs because of the similarity between Sarkozy’s electoral slogan and Gonzi’s Flimkien Kollox Possibbli.
Yet watching the news the other night I suddenly realised where Sant got his own slogan from: Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change in Zimbabwe. Tsvangirai campaigned under the slogan ‘For a new beginning’. In his case, it had resonance with the electorate, given that they are fighting against the oppression of Robert Mugabe, unbelievable inflation, hunger, no income, the negation of the most basic human rights, and death and torture squads. Trust Alfred Sant, with his fond belief that you can create reality through the dogged deployment of language, to think that the same slogan would resonate with the electorate here in Malta, with its cushy life that some people define as hardship (try getting your home repossessed in the US and living out of your car with the kids and the dog).
It can’t have been Jason Micallef who picked that slogan off the international news, because he comes across as the sort who doesn’t even know where/what Zimbabwe is. Zimbabwe? Is that a new kind of hair gel?
And it can’t have been Joseph Muscat, either, because he’s the sort who would probably side with Mugabe, giving his strange comment in The Times last Monday about the Chinese and Tibet.
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This is completely off-topic, but very interesting. A long essay by leftist Micheal Briguglio on Labour between 96 and 2003:
http://www.michaelbriguglio.com/PostscriptJanuary2004.pdf
While the slogan may have been South African, his tactics are certainly Harvard-grown – check this article by a Sunday Times of London columnist who talks about what Harvard University teaches. Fat lot of good it did the MLP …
Antoine
Hi Daphne,
I’m surprised you missed out on the other bit from South Africa. Not only did they have “A New Beginning”, but they also used the term “Good Governance” as a political slogan. Last time I saw it as in their recent media conference to announce that they had won a majority in their parliament.
Did you notice anything else? Well, they got their long-awaited 50.3% majority – something Jason must have been dreaming about when he announced at the counting halls that there was evidence to show that one party had got an absolute majority.
So many similarities. Our rugby team will win the world cup, next. :)