A prescient piece of writing

I have had yet another email from a former law reporter (not with The Malta Independent) who confirmed that Franco Debono used to hound (her choice of verb) her and her fellow law reporters until they put his name in the newspapers.

Then I remembered that my former editor had written this.

A LUMP OF COAL FOR FRANCO
by Stephen Calleja

Article published in The Malta Independent on 27 December 2009

Franco Debono has been more popular than Father Christmas these past two weeks. But, unlike the figure in a red robe and a white beard, the lawyer from Ghaxaq was featuring in the media for all the wrong reasons.

Dr Debono enjoys seeing his name in print. He is that kind of lawyer. Even before he became an MP, he used to hound journalists assigned to cover the law courts to give them copies of judgments, court applications and arraignments just to get a mention in newspapers. He still does.

The most important thing is not the court case in question; it is to have a last sentence announcing to the world that he is representing the accused.

Now that he has a place in Parliament, his ego has grown to even bigger proportions and he is unable to control it. It was therefore no surprise to those who know him, or know what type of person he is, that he behaved the way he did during the last parliamentary session before the Christmas recess.

It is, in fact, the way he has been behaving since being elected for the first time in March 2008.

All politicians love seeing their photos or their statements in the media, but Dr Debono (and a few others) likes it even more. And this sometimes pushes him into doing things out of the ordinary, maybe to regret them later.

His quest for publicity is putting him into a corner from which it will be hard for him to work his way out.

There are other unhappy backbenchers in the Nationalist camp, but they are not compromising themselves the way Dr Debono is doing. They are speaking up when and where it really matters, having realised that the public statements they made earlier in this term were causing more harm than good – to the party, but mostly to themselves.

Dr Debono has not understood that, by washing his dirty linen in public, he is putting his own, young, political career in jeopardy. Nationalist supporters will not forgive him if, through his behaviour, the Gonzi government collapses – in much the same way that Labour supporters have never forgiven Dom Mintoff for stoking the fire in the Alfred Sant 1996 government, which ultimately led to its downfall 22 months after taking office.

For hard-line Labour supporters, Mintoff had been a saviour, an idol and a hero, but it took little for the tables to be turned and for him to be called a traitor.

It will be the same for Dr Debono with the Nationalists – and, to put it mildly, Dr Debono does not have the same pedigree, history and background that Mintoff had. Saying that Dr Debono will be ostracised by his own supporters and party, if he repeats what Mintoff did, is an understatement.

Dr Debono is a newcomer to politics, and yet he seems to expect to move up the ranks before gaining the experience required. He has just made it into Parliament, and yet he seems to want to become at least a parliamentary secretary, a position to which colleagues with more experience, and with a better personal result in the last election, have not been appointed either. He is part of a team, and yet he does not want to play by the rules.

Who does he think he is?

The way Dr Debono is getting himself and his party into trouble will have the reverse effect. The man has made it clear that he cannot be trusted, and his chances of being given something that he (wrongly) expects have fallen to almost nothing. He does not have the patience to bide his time and build up his political career one step at a time. He might not say it publicly, but perhaps he is already dreaming that he will, one day, be in Castille.

There is nothing wrong with personal ambition. What is wrong is that it is too early for someone like Dr Debono to be given the importance he thinks he deserves. And the way he has behaved shows how right Dr Gonzi is in not giving him the post for which he is vying.

Toddlers have to learn how to walk before they can learn how to run.

But it seems that Dr Debono feels he is ready to compete in the 100-metre sprint when he has not learnt to tie up his shoes. He wants to be the prima donna when he can barely sing a few notes.

He is taking a big risk. He says that he is doing what his constituents want, which I very much doubt. None of his constituents would want the kind of instability that Dr Debono has created for his own government and party.

To me, he is just trying to grab media attention, and by doing so the wrong way he might find it harder to be elected next time around. By giving hope to the Labour Party that there could be a repetition of 1998, with the roles reversed, he might as well not contest the next election.

To him goes my lump of coal this Christmas.