Please read this on the subject of how what Malta is doing with China is the REVERSE of what larger and smarter European countries are doing
Posted by H. P. Baxxter:
Some of your readers have been posting comments saying they disagree with the lies and secrets in Joseph Muscat’s and Malta’s deals with China, but that essentially he is just doing what other EU countries are doing, viz. encouraging Chinese investment.
Not so.
I don’t know where we got this from. It’s probably our own pundits’ fault. They are mostly stupid. And the bright ones are in cahoots with Labour.
So let’s set the record straight.
Other EU countries are SELLING their technology and services to China. In other words, it is they who are investing in China. That’s what outsourcing and offshoring means. European companies moving their production facilities to China.
Some of the readers mention France and Germany. France is selling high-speed train technology to China. Germany sells engineering and other technology. Siemens China is a massive company.
What the Maltese government wants is the exact reverse: China selling products to Malta and opening its factories in Malta.
Except China won’t open any factories here. For God’s sake, everyone is moving to China because it’s cheaper, and China will open a factory HERE IN MALTA? What for? The world’s major markets are right at home in China and on its doorstep in the Pacific Rim.
And yet this is what some of our genius “economists” are writing in their weekly columns. How stupid or disingenuous do you have to be to peddle such nonsense?
Let me talk about Maltese industry and technology, because there is a sea of ignorance on the subject.
ST Microelectronics alone is 50% of Malta’s export value. Fifty per cent. Half. If it goes, we’re f*cked. And it nearly did, back in Lawrence Gonzi’s time. His government only managed to persuade ST to stay put by funding some of its R&D and dangling other carrots. And that was a massive achievement.
ST Microelectronics is mostly French and Italian. It does and makes things Joseph Muscat wouldn’t even dream of (because he is the sort who thinks electronics are bozoz). It is a European company.
Now I put it to your readers: what do you think is being discussed at the boardroom table over at ST? How do you think the government’s strategy reads?
That’s right. It’s a message to ST that it can f*ck off to Tunisia, because now we have China hiiiii.
And they will. They’re only hanging on by a thread as it is, anyway. If Malta is flooded with Chinese companies, as Joseph Muscat is predicting, then it’s goodbye ST.
Helga Ellul got it so right. That woman is a national treasure.
Joseph Muscat went to China. But he should be doing the exact opposite. He should have gone to Germany, France, Italy, the UK, the Nordic countries and Poland and negotiated MOUs with them, so they can set up shop in Malta, because it’s cheap and the workforce is skilled.
Joseph Muscat has just signed the final death sentence for Maltese industry.
Well-f*cking-done. And Simon Busuttil says that investment from China will be positive.
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Joseph Muscat seems to be the kind of person for whom productive work and money are not related, perhaps because he never really had to work for a living.
He doesn’t care about work, all he cares about is money and he thinks that China will be giving us all the renminbis we need as long as we’re their “showcase” and their “partner” – actually their mole – within the European Union.
Qisu qahba f’xalata. Jaghmel ghal flus, jitfghulu c-cicri u jiftahar bihom.
And isn’t doing the opposite of what should be done all part of the plan?
What he’s after is a de facto exit from the EU, its investment strategy, energy vision, social contracts and anything which might cause problems for Muscat’s MOU in the very near future.
That includes freedom of speech, the right to access information, the right to consume products without impinging on others’ fundamental rights, the list endless.
This is a cultural war, the fact that the PM expects a pat on the back for patronising state owned ‘industry’, sells impossible projects as being conditions for economic development et al, has shifted the paradigm to that of a doctored, state sanctioned and centralised economy.
He’s talking shared jurisdiction, avoiding EU regulations like the plague, to turn the local financial services sector, something we should be proud of, into the next Cyprus.
Except that his ‘dream’ will service Chinese kickback money, not Russian cash.
There’s absolutely no mention of any R&D except if this corresponds to Chinese interests, indeed, R&D has become something to be sanctioned by the Chinese, imagine an independent enterprise working on a proposal to beat their ‘technology’.
And all we get from the PN is a feeble excuse for ‘creativity’ to counter this takeover.
There’s an inextricable link between the People’s Republic’s oppression of free speech, art and industrial design and the utter failure to create anything remotely original and successful on the market.
And that, call it style, is itself impossible to separate from evolved cultural models, which advanced thinking was always the result of democracy, choice and an ever more fickle market.
Muscat’s pathetic if he actually believes he can make a success story of some forced labour camp selling all sorts of fake rubbish to Malta’s ‘internal market’.
All he has in his favour, is an absolute dormant PN, dowdy, apologetic and crucially, a victim of the new chattering class’s spiel; that somehow our taste, our way of life, our aspirations and our vulgar wants were GonziPN’s fault.
It’s an exchange of excuses, that someone else always get to blame.
Work, efficiency, know-how, cutting edge, radical nowhere to be seen.
My theory that Muscat will take the laziest route possible still holds up.
Apply it to any scenario and you will find he always takes the easy way out. Always.
Let’s be clear about a few things:
i) if Baxxter thinks that other countries are only engaged in selling technology and services to China, he is woefully misinformed. Greece? Ireland? Portugal? Italy? Cyprus? He really needs to do a bit more research. Germany, the UK and France do export technology to China, but they are not turning a blind eye to the possibility of job creation from Chinese investment in their own country. Embassies in Beijing have offices specifically to promote this
ii) ‘China’ already has one factory in Malta – Leisure Clothing, which (if I’m not mistaken) employs around 100 people, half of whom are Maltese. The company manufactures garments which are then exported to the rest of the EU. Now, I suppose any company that remains in Malta does so because their operation is commercially viable. Why would other Chinese companies necessarily be discouraged from manufacturing other items in Malta with the aim of exporting to the rest of the EU and North Africa?
iii) Baxxter notes that ‘ST Electronics is 50% of Malta’s export value’ and relates efforts made by the previous administration to ensure that the company maintained its presence in Malta. But isn’t it a scandal that after 15 years of uninterrupted Nationalist rule the Gonzi government left office with heavy dependence on a single company as its legacy? If Baxxter is encouraging the Prime Minister to tour around Europe advertising Malta – if this is still necessary in the year 2014 – what does that say about the efforts of the previous government? We can argue all day about the desirability or otherwise of investment from particular countries, but that we appear to be in such dire straits is hardly a ringing endorsement of the state of affairs as of March 9, 2013.
iv) It seems as if Baxxter is being needlessly alarmist. After all, if China ‘won’t open up any factories here’ how can anyone have ‘signed the final death sentence for Maltese industry’? Is ST Microelectronics going to leave Malta in a fit of jealousy? In any case, seeking new sources of investment and taking care of companies that are in your territory are not mutually exclusive.
[Daphne – OK, unless you’re just having fun being the devil’s advocate here, you like the government’s dealings with China. We get it. You have made your point. It’s all over the subtext of your several comments on the subject. Now what you need to tell us is how, why and in what way you are involved and what your vested or particular interest is. It’s called context.]
I’m not entering into partisan politics and I don’t see how you can claim that I ‘like the government’s dealings with China’ from my previous or any other of my comments.
[Daphne – Words, writing and the decoding of meaning, fautdemieux, are my stock in trade. But even if they were not, it is perfectly obvious that you have a special interest in this subject as it is the only one which has motivated you to comment, and not just the once, but doggedly, repeatedly and persistently. You also have the defensive reactions of somebody who is not merely a dispassionate observer. You have also used myths and false information to convince yourself of how right you are: like the ‘fact’ that the government of Malta (the PN one) ‘gave’ China a house right next to the Foreign Ministry for its cultural institute, when that house was private property and sold to China by the private owner in a private deal.]
I think that this comment of Baxxter’s is foolish and that people like him who are reflexively anti-China have a harmful influence on other minds, many of whom belong to people who know nothing about the country. I’d say the same if he was spreading erroneous information about the US, Japan, etc. – facts matter. I’m very happy to tell you how I’m involved if you supply me with your e-mail address.
[Daphne – Baxxter is quite right about China. Totalitarian communist states are poor bed-partners for free and democratic states because they do not share the same values and operate at an entirely different level. This would not be so much of a problem if the sizes were reversed – if China were the size of Malta and Malta the size of China – but a totalitarian communist behemoth ‘working with’ an island state 17 miles by nine and with a population of 450,000 is a recipe for disaster…for the latter. My email address is dcgalizia@gmail.com]
It may surprise you to learn that I’m not fond of the government’s current China policy (and many other policies). If I’ve only spoken up about China, it’s because – usually – I agree with you, and find little to add considering that in most of your arguments and articles you cover all of the bases.
I’ll happily disclose my name and identity over e-mail. As for the issue of ‘false myths and facts’ – I was wrong about the manner in which the Chinese Cultural Institute came to be located on Melita Street – but right about the fact that the Cultural Institute and Confucius Centre were both founded in Malta under the Nationalists – and if you are worried about the Chinese obtaining a foothold on Malta, then the decisions to allow both have to be classified as mistakes in judgment.
[Daphne – Mamma mia, there you go again. Did you study logic? Well, then, you would know that if the premiss on which you have built your argument is false, then your argument is fallacious. You cannot have a sound argument built on a false premiss. Your false premiss is that the government of Malta GAVE China premises for its cultural institute, and made sure that those premises were symbolically right next to the Foreign Ministry to convey how important China is to Malta. On this you built your argument that the Nationalist government courted China and seated it at its right hand. You cannot simply brush off the fact that China bought the property from its private owner in a private deal, as I explained to you – it is just the most remarkable coincidence, isn’t it, that my grandparents lived next door for half a century – and persist in your argument as though this changes nothing.
That the Confucious Centre and the China Cultural Institute were set up when the PN was in government is a complete irrelevance. Malta is a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights and espouses and upholds, under the law and the Constitution, all the freedoms. The government therefore does not get involved in whether China sets up shop to promote its ideas in Malta, and it cannot prevent the promotion of ‘Confucian ideas’ or Chinese culture even if it wanted to. If it did, it would be China, not Malta. Malta is obliged to respect the human rights even of those who do not respect the human rights of others. There are several weird sects and religions setting up shop in Malta – are you now going to suggest that the government somehow plays a part in that, or that failure to stop them signifies approval? It doesn’t – it just means that the government is upholding the right of religious freedom.]
“People like him who are reflexively anti-China have a harmful influence on other minds.”
Spoken like a true anti-liberal. Poor you.
I am not reflexively anti-China. I looked at the facts and reached a conclusion. And people are free to make up their own minds.
Harmful influence indeed. Everyone else is praising this deal to high heaven. I’d say they have a great deal more influence than me.
I am not here to provide testimonials for the previous administration, but to analyse the present one. And indeed, I am Lawrence Gonzi’s fiercest critic. Which is why Nationalists don’t like me.
Lawrence Gonzi’s economic policy was unsustainable in the long term. The long term is now the short term, and Joseph Muscat’s economic policy, which is nothing but Lawrence Gonzi’s stripped of the good bits, is still unsustainable. Neither of them seems to have ever looked at a map.
No, fautdemieux is simply a liar.
Italy just sold 40% of its Ansaldo to Shanghai Electric ON CONDITION that China press with on with its conversion to gas within stipulated time frames, and that’s leaving Ansaldo employees with a future, the major stakeholder being government and future revisions at the discretion of the Italian government. No dates, just an open ended get out clause.
The onus being on SE to keep up with Ansaldo’s reputation.
Renzi also signed an MOU, this one with Confindustria, to reinforce and back every effort made by its members to defend, uphold and improve any instrument in favour of everything ‘Made in Italy’
That’s Matteo Renzi for you.
Leisure Clothing eh? They couldn’t even come up with a name other than a product descriptor.
Regarding the ‘scandal’ with ST, perhaps that would be when Labour nearly sent it packing with the most convoluted tax regime ever invented. Thank goodness the man threw a tantrum in Gavino Gulia Square in one of his more memorable ill-fitting jackets. The hair keeping on for dear life.
Of course China won’t open any factories, China doesn’t have factories; China has contractors, all they do is sell manpower.
Guess why all this hullabaloo about technology sharing, the world’s largest country coming to tiny Malta to share technology.
Yeah right, more like keeping an eye on every EU project and possible spin-offs finding their way here.
Ever heard of Desertec? It’s not Chinese, can’t be, requires something like cooperation between the littoral countries of the Med. One of the obstacles being how to promote its ownership. You won’t come across that kind of reasoning with astonishingly fast decisions.
Ever seen one of their cars? Brilliance they’re called, capable of folding back to the original sized roll of sheet-metal when crash tested.
They had the gall to attempt marketing it at the ‘mature’ motorist, taf int, if someone else crashes into the tinbox, it’s not really their fault.
Even Central government realised they can’t just flog it abroad, meantime millions of Chinese drive these mobile concertinas. To think Lancia lost its reputation to rust.
The problem isn’t just that Muscat won’t come clean on anything, it’s just that he’s tackling China the wrong way round, going to those whose interest contradicts any genuine Chinese talent out there.
And don’t give me m’hemmx x’taghmel, kollox tal-istat. Isn’t China supposed to be the ultimate miracle in hybrid open market policies? Such is your hypocrisy.
No position, no open discussion, no agenda and, perhaps this one most significant, no stakeholder officially invited.
Guess you’re either into fake eggs, or don’t give a toss if that’s what the average Chinese expect to get.
Currently there is a dispute going on between USA and China on Chinese solar panels imported in the USA:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/uciliawang/2014/06/19/report-u-s-trade-dispute-will-inflict-pains-on-chinese-solar-manufacturers/
Yingli Solar is China’s biggest manufacturer of solar panels and was a major sponsor of Brazil’s World Cup:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3x3UURuNV0k
I think that Joseph Muscat is trying to get these solar panels in Malta and just rebrand them for sale in the EU and USA; avoiding companies like Yingli Solar any excess taxes.
Currently, the issue of renewable energy, especially solar, is heard frequently on TVM news and Konrad Mizzi has also mentioned it quite a number of times.
Update on the dispute from yesterday.
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-28301144
You see why Alex Sceberras Trigona could be useful at the WTO?
That was the situation some months back, until German manufacturers stood up and pressed for real implementation of competition laws.
It then resulted that all Chinese panel manufacturers were operating below cost, losses absorbed by Chinese credit institutions.
All recent ‘defaults’ in China registered by solar panel corporations. And that’s only because China reluctantly subscribed to a minimum of data gathering and analysis.
To date, its shadow banking system remains off limits.
That my dears, is the dragon.
Of course, China is interested in Malta, because better said, Malta is of interest to China.
1. You are wrong because the results are pulpable.
2. Don’t give politicians free advice. Charge a fee.
Politicians aren’t interested in my advice. Or I would have set up my consulting firm long ago. Plus I don’t have the credentials.
You are logical and rational which is what works against you in Maltese political circles.
Maltese political parties want entuzjazmu, not inteligenza. Which is why they attract the wrong sort.
I am not sure I agree with Baxxter’s analysis, in the sense that I do not detect that Muscat is suggesting that the Chinese should set up industrial factories here.
I think Muscat’s vision – which is that of China – is to use Malta as a logistics centre where China can have an airport and a port base in the Mediterranean from where to serve Africa and Europe. Hence Malta’s position on the blue Silk Road, as we heard this week from Guiyang.
Earlier on in the legislature, I had compared Muscat’s role in the Chinese global scheme of things to that of a regional CEO for the Mediterranean, North Africa and the Middle East regions. I do not think I was far off the mark. Maybe I should add the EU also.
I disagree with anyone who says that Malta does not have a strategic location, or that it never had one.
Malta was central to the control by Britain of the trade and travel route from Britain all the way to the Indian and Pacific Oceans, where Britain had important interests: India, Singapore, Hong Kong and Australia.
Malta remains conveniently located for seafarers along the Mediterranean on the same route, with the added feature that China lies the same route.
I can see China wanting to use Malta as a hub for shipping, maybe even air travel.
This probably explains why Muscat wants to develop a maritime centre at the former Marsa Shipbuilding.
Recently, I heard Muscat argue how the Luqa airport was close to the Marsaxlokk port and that the two assets could be used on a combined basis.
He is now speaking more openly about logistics: warehousing and transportation.
Among other things, the MOU with China addresses the development of ports, flights and transport.
He is also speaking about a monorail. What do we know about this monorail? Is he going to connect Luqa to Marsaxlokk, so that goods airfreighted to Malta directly from the Eastern and Southern provinces of China can find their way to Marsaxlokk ready for storage and transshipment?
Add to that the possibility that China has applied for some related land reclamation project: an offshore port or airport – who knows?
One would also need to add a possible role for Malta role in the transportation of resources (oil and gas especially) and raw materials. A lot of those originate in Africa, and a lot of them are now controlled by China. Oil and gas pipelines through the Mediterranean, storage and transshipment at Marsaxlokk, could all be part of China’s plan.
Going by his recent speeches and TV interviews, Muscat is gradually revealing the Chinese intentions about Malta vis-a-vis Europe: Use Malta to warehouse and dispatch goods and raw materials/resources into Europe. Having one base to manage 28 countries could be useful for China.
This vision has some sense, because China has taken the role of Britain and Europe as a base for industrial production.
In this vision, Malta would be to China what Hong Kong and Singapore were to Britain: regional trade hubs in the remote parts of the world from where the Empire can control its regional interests.
So effectively Malta becomes a Chinese colony, like Hong Kong and Singapore were British colonies.
This is the roadmap. So smooth. Pure silk. An Economic Silk Road. Leading all the way to the Great Hall of The People, Tienanmen Square, Beijing, China.
Joseph Muscat did mention that Malta could become “another Singapore or Dubai.” He did not mention Hong Kong, but he probably meant that too, although he could be emphasising the Chinese connection too much.
If China is really envisioning this, then they are modelling themselves on the British Empire, and their acts can be predicted.
Over to you, military strategists.
Do you know what a “hub” actually means?
Maritime traffic? What is the cargo tonnage capacity of Rotterdam? And of Antwerp? And Hamburg, my city?
And Malta?
Air travel? How many planes land at Heathrow per day? And at Charles de Gaulle? Frankfurt?
And Malta?
Malta can never be the physical hub of anything, because it is tiny. I hope we can at least agree on this.
I agree. But then there is land reclamation – a top secret of the current government which has escaped media attention.
Yet, I never said if I agree with the vision. This is probably where Muscat’s vision may be naive.
Pie-in-the-sky, Ciccio.
China’s building a rail link all the way to Hamburg, which has land and sea connections to mainland Europe.
China already uses Malta for transshipment to North Africa. Millions of contraband cigarettes, hundreds of thousands of shoes, tens of thousands of clothing items, and tens of thousands of bottles of shampoo were intercepted last year. All were counterfeit products destined for North Africa.
That’s the bit Muscat didn’t mention when he read the speech China expected him to make.
Bottom line: what’s in it for us – politically, socially, financially, economically, environmentally?
Nothing. Anyone with a bit of sense and nothing to pin them down has already left Malta.
“what’s in it for us – politically, socially, financially, economically, environmentally?”
Baxxter’s reply is only partial. The full answer is of course:
Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing and nothing.
What would Labour get out of it, though? Perpetual rule over a stretch of land which becomes increasingly dysfunctional and worthless as a state, propped up by their Chinese paymasters.
It’s basically Labour returning to their Mintoffian roots and taking the easy way out rather than developing a nation for the better and winning over people’s hearts and minds by sound reasoning in free and fair elections.
It seems things are going to get ugly quickly unless we get a more effective opposition and take to the streets with mass demonstrations taking place. And the likelihood of either happening isn’t looking too good at the moment.
@calculator
You need to ask what the individuals involved get out of it.
What do Chinese officials get out of short termist mega-deals in a country where the rule of law doesn’t exist?
In other words, let me summarise my point. China wants Malta for infrastructure, not as a production base as such. China wants Malta as a cross way between the regions of its interest: Europe and Africa, the Atlantic and the Middle East.
Malta’s membership of the EU and the Maltese financial services centre are major assets in all this, but these are still “infrastructural” issues.
What I don’t understand about this ‘Malta as a showcase’ proposition is this: If European companies are going to China to produce their goods cheaply, then what’s the point of showcasing those goods in Malta, when surely they have their own showcases in Berlin, Paris and London?
If, on the other hand, the plan for Malta is to showcase made in China products which are the brainchild inventions of Chinese firms, and not cheap counterfeits of European/Japanese/American etc inventions, what are these uniquely Chinese inventions? Indeed, are there enough to fill the vetrina?
Baxxter hit the nail on the head. Since this China boondoggle started emerging, I was always of the opinion, and this based on facts as I read them in foreign news media, that while the larger western democracies deal with China in a win-win manner, we are dealing with China in a win-lose way. They win, we lose.
The Chinese are always out to make a buck and their interest is not to make other countries rich. In fact it would suit them if we remain in dire straits so that they would always be able to dangle carrots and pull the strings while we dance to their tune.
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2014-07-16/opinions/is-china-a-menace-5858525186/
Having fought tooth and nail against Malta’s joining the EU, Muscat seems to have found good use for membership: make Malta China’s gateway to Europe.
He’s just been quoted by the newspapers as having said that the world is not just the EU. This is his way of justifying his obsession with China and his glorification of it. So his perception of the ‘world’ boils down to communist dictatorships and failed states like Libya.
I am concerned about the way the PN has reacted to this state of affairs with China. To avoid being depicted as ‘negative’ it is describing as ‘positive’ even things which are not. Muscat has managed to condition the PN’s way of thinking and of opposing.
Labour got into power by relentlessly tearing everything and everyone to shreds – yes, even good things and good people. In Opposition it was a force for destruction, and yet it conditioned people into thinking that the PN was and is negative, despite its own destructiveness.
The PN should take this situation seriously, because the way I see it, with its fear of criticising in case it is criticised in turn, Muscat is getting away with murder.
It’s always unhealthy and dangerous to have just one company having 50% of a country’s exports.
So what if S.T leaves, it would be healthier to have it replaced by two or three smaller companies.
I agree with you, Mrs H.Ellul is a capable woman. I would appreciate it, if should give us her opinion on the fact that Lufthansa has now new partners, you know who? Those dangerous monsters from China.
Healthy, healthier, healthiest.
You are talking complete nonsense.
Economies of scale, my dear Silvio. Your three of four companies wouldn’t have ST’s critical mass for R&D and hi-tech stuff.
But I suppose you’re the sort who’s happy with fabbriki tal-elf.
My god, the ignorance in this country.
http://www.ecfr.eu/blog/entry/a_subtle_change_in_merkels_tone_on_china
“Most of all, however, Merkel will speak her mind on the question of political freedom. In her speech at Tsinghua University the chancellor did not mince words when she described what it had meant for her as someone raised in East Germany to finally experience political freedom.
“Twenty-five years ago, at the time of the peaceful revolution in the GDR, I was lucky enough to experience the way that freedom and the free expression of opinion was suddenly possible.”
The meaning of this for China cannot have been lost on the students listening to her: it is 25 years since Tiananmen Square as well as since the fall of the Berlin Wall.”