Evarist Guevara wants a Palace Square uprising – but he doesn't want to be the first to pitch his tent

When I grow up, I want to be Evarist Bartolo

Will Evarist Bartolo ever grow up? I mean, the man must be at least 60 by now, but he behaves like the eternal late 1960s student with a poster of Che Guevara on his cruddy bedroom wall.

First he hitches a ride on Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando’s back, like a parasite fish suckering onto a shark, to get some of the kudos of the divorce bill.

Now here he is, displaying total lack of imagination and an insufficient understanding of the fact that what is appropriate for students and people in their 20s looks ridiculous on somebody about to get his bus pass.

He is – wait for it – AGITATING ON FACEBOOK FOR A TAHRIR SQUARE-TYPE UPRISING.

Yes, indeed.

Ma, xi dwejjaq ta’ nies.

I doubt that he has an audience of young people, so what is he after, exactly? Imagine the scenario: a Facebook revolution of middle-aged Maltese people, balding men with tummies and ageing Botoxed women in very tight jeans and blowdried hair dyed unrealistic shades, gathering in Palace Square and then after five minutes getting bored and decamping to Cordina for a capuccino.

“If we have people in Parliament who try to belittle the democratic decision we should gather the public in the piazza in front of Parliament and not leave until what has been decided is enacted,” he wrote. “Are we lesser than those who in the past months took to the streets to make their voices heard on both sides of the Mediterranean, when others tried to silence them?”

Hasta la revolucion siempre!

Tal-biki u tas-suttar.

And typical Evarist: he wants us to revolt, but he’s not going to be the first one to make a move. I don’t see him there in Palace Square in his tent with his Thermos flask this morning.

Another thing: as if I or anyone else is going to take lessons from Evarist Bartolo in democracy and rising up against anti-democratic politicians. When I first met him, way back in 1985, Malta was under the yoke of a government that did not have the support of the majority of the electorate. There were uprisings in public squares and open spaces almost every Sunday – it was our weekend ‘entertainment’. But Evarist Bartolo rooted for that bloody corrupt rabble and wasn’t ashamed to say so.

Get your bus pass, Evarist, then do the country a favour and p*ss off.