The schism becomes a chasm
Last Friday’s performance at the Labour Party points to a fundamental schism that has now become a chasm. This is what divides the typical, old-style Laburisti, who make up the majority of party delegates and supporters, from the truly new Labour element that is far, far removed from the fictitiously ‘new’ Labour of Alfred Sant.
George Abela is not just another leadership contender, but the representative of a particular strain of thinking within the Labour Party. This is the pro-active, positive-thinking, can-do, chip-free element that is light years away from the negative, resentful, fearful, anti-change, no-clue-how-things-should-be-done, they-owe-me-a-living attitude of almost everyone else within that party.
I can usually guess which way somebody votes by his or her attitude to life in general. Sometimes I’m wrong, but only sometimes – because on the whole, people who are energetic and who have initiative, who are pro-active and outward-looking, who enjoy challenges and who understand that no one owes them a living, who strive to improve their lot through their own hard work, determination and efforts, who are enthusiastic for more and better work, tend to vote Nationalist. Those who are brimful of resentment, who think that they are owed something by somebody somewhere, who are negative, defeatist, fearful of change, envious of others yet who won’t go out of their way to improve their own lives, tend to vote Labour.
This is a generalisation, but it is far from a gross generalisation. It is actually a very safe one. Of course, there are exceptions, as with everything else, especially when you consider that so many people here vote out of habit or in line with family tradition. But on the whole, I usually find that proactive people with initiative are attracted to the Nationalist Party while negative and defeatist people with personal resentments and chips on their shoulder are attracted to the Labour Party.
This is the reason why young people from Labour families start voting Nationalist when they go into tertiary education or begin to develop successful lives and careers. Labour politicians have gone on record as saying that they think this is because these young people are ashamed of being associated with Labour as they see it as the partit tal-hamalli. Oh, how wrong they are. It’s not that at all, but goes much deeper. A person who comes from a Labour working-class background but who strives for wider horizons, a broader outlook, and a more interesting life with a good career has the aspirations and the attitude that align him or her to the Nationalist Party, and not to Labour. People from working-class Labour backgrounds who want to get ahead in life vote Nationalist not because of shame but because of politics, policies and beliefs.
Labour has become a party for losers, and I don’t mean that in the electoral sense. The Nationalists, on the other hand, have somehow managed to become a party for can-doers and winners. The unspoken (and sometimes spoken) exhortation that underpins virtually every message coming out of the Nationalist Party and the governments it has formed over the last 21 years is essentially this: ‘You can do it. Stride right in and conquer.’ Labour’s message over the equivalent period? ‘You can’t do it. It’s impossible. You will never survive.’ This is the main reason why the two parties have come to attract completely different kinds of people, and why the George Abela faction is in such an unwanted minority within the Labour Party.
Friday’s meeting was a metaphor for all of this. The George Abela faction is made up entirely – at least, as far as I can observe – of go-getting people with initiative who have made something of their lives and who are acutely sensitive to the new direction that Labour must take if it is to equip itself for the 21st century. At the Friday meeting, this faction was clearly distinct from the rest in terms of content and delivery of speeches, manner of dress and general attitude. It is the faction that represents the only viable future for Labour, but sadly, it seems to have been consigned to the past already.
So isn’t Joseph Muscat one of those go-getting people with initiative, then? Well, yes – and no. A mysterious ingredient is missing. While it is undeniable that he is rabidly ambitious and all out to get to the top, there is something there, or perhaps something not there, which slots him into a different category entirely to the ‘can-do’ people I’m talking about. I get a weird sense that the man is going through the motions as though he’s acting a part in a play, without really grasping what it’s all about – like somebody who is sitting for an examination having learned all the texts by rote but without truly getting a handle on them, so all he can do is repeat what was learned by heart rather than interpreting what was learned. I would definitely slot him into the Old Labour category along with Alfred Sant, because Old Labour wasn’t just about violence and corruption but also about one’s attitude to life.
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@ Daphne : this quote came to mind after reading your commentary “The winner has a solution for every problem , the loser has a problem for every solution”
@ reader : What are you a loser or a winner?
I agree with you entirely.Without even thinking about it,they said they for 19000 tesserati to vote in such a short time is impossible.All they had to do is this:a}Print 20,000 ballot papers with the names of the candidates conteting the election for leader.B}Distribute them in their respective localities numbering the amount of tesserati in that particular locality.c}Have the paid up members vote for their preferred candidate and the one with the majority of votes obviously will be the winner.ONLY THEN can the delegates of that particular locality will vote for the preferred candidate by popular vote.
The running script during yesterday evening’s One news quoted MLCP as saying, during her visit to some open air market, that her party needed to ‘aspire trust’ (jaspira fiducja). They probably meant ‘inspire trust’ (jispira fiducja). That`s what the MLP must do … inspire trust, not in the 141,888 voters who voted MLP. That’s preaching to the converted and of little use. MLP must inspire trust in some hundreds who voted PN so that next time round they would vote MLP and hand the party a victory, a majority and the government. Only that on Friday’s showing, it will be quite difficult for MLP to do it (there’s no need to repeat the gist of today’s post).
Meanwhile, the probable winner of June’s competition tried to rouse the enthusiasm of the crowd listening with bated breath by declaring what a wretch of a PN government we have, as if elections were due in some weeks` time, not two months past.
Will it be another five years of Sunday morning sermons for the converted and simply hoping that when the time next comes round there will be enough disgruntled PN voters who will stay at home to turn MLP into the largest party of the two by default?
Daphne, I’ve got a chip on my shoulder the size of a battleship. And yet I voted PN. Twice. Just sayin’…
http://www.maltastar.com/pages/msrv/msfullart.asp?an=21012
Do these guys EVER read the news or are aware of what’s happening in the world?
Dear bloggers,
Let’s continue the ‘DCG and her blog’s writers poke their nose into OUR internal affairs’ game shall we?
Will the MLP split up in the near future or not? What do you think?
@Daphne:
You’re absolutely right about Labourites being negative,fearful of change, defeatist etc etc..
In my opinion, these people would have to be so, if not stupid or ignorant, to vote for such a pack of losers like that.
Even more can be said about floating or disgruntled PN voters…they are, for the most part, such a selfish and bitter herd.
Ideally, what this island needs(besides some logic and common sense) is another large and sensible political party (no, not AD,AN or the Lowellian ones). This party, acting as direct competition for the other two major ones, would probably force both the PN and MLP to step up their game(proactively). If one of the parties doesn’t change, it theoretically wont be able to compete as well as the others and hence leave two suitable parties in Government AND Opposition(for once).
forgot to mention conspiracy theorists by the looks of some user comments on this blog.
This article is simply another reason why I will never again vote Nationalist in my life. The arrogant presumption that Labour families’ offspring start voting PN as soon as they start tertiary education is another of those big fat lies which we have become used to coming from Daphne and her gang of blue eyed boys.
[Moderator – Mcomb, several Labour MPs have said the same thing. Are they part of Daphne’s gang of blue-eyed boys?]
All is not lost for those of us, genuine Labourites, who see in George Abela the last chance for Labour to become electable before it vanishes into history. Getting 21% of the vote against all odds is a feat in itself.
Michael Cohen and Pawlu Farrugia are mere mouth pieces of ‘il- magna tal-partit’. They are valid village politicians who are out of their depth in playing the national game. How they dare stall the needed change is unbelievable. They should be apologising to us Labourites for electing the wrong leader over and over agin leading to one defeat after another. What do we have to thank Alfred Sant for? For throwing away three consecutive elections? For having pipi in his pants when rushing to early elections in 1998?
In the remaining three weeks George Abela will build on the evident momentum and as he said in Gozo yesterday he will persuade more delegates that only real change can render Labour as the party of the majority.
Have you seen Bondi+ yesterday? There was a ‘Xarabank journalist’ (didn’t know they existed) who seems to be a Labourite with very genuine and passionate views. Liked and agreed with most of the arguments he put forward.
And Dr. Borg Cardona seems to be quite a colourful character… never met him, but he seems to be a bag of laughs socially!!
Can I let you in on a secret????? The MLP DO NOT have a database or a list of the current paid up members! So that’s why they cannot allow the paid up members to vote for their leader.
You mean to say that they do not know where il-flus tal-mizata qed jispiccaw?
Mcomb: “This article is simply another reason why I will never again vote Nationalist in my life. The arrogant presumption that Labour families’ offspring start voting PN as soon as they start tertiary education is another of those big fat lies which we have become used to coming from Daphne and her gang of blue eyed boys.”
@ Mcomb: It is not a big, fat lie, it is REALITY, and the faster you realise that it is the truth and start modernising, but really modernising the mentality which prevails within the MLP, the better. I know tens of ex-Labour undergraduates who, having graduated and made a life for themselves, will now not even DREAM of voting Labour, and some of them are closely related to me. They might not exaclty be in love with the Nationalist Party, but they know that the PN is a party of go-getters and doers, and they also know that this is the kind of party they need in Government to continue to make a success of their lives.
@amrio – if you bump into me somewhere where good wine is sold, introduce yourself and press a good glass of red into my hand … bag of laughs indeed….
Amrio: “Will the MLP split up in the near future or not? What do you think?”
@ Amrio: I am kind of hoping that there will be some form of split, because this seems to be the only way for a really “new”, more mature and more open Socialist party to be born.
The question is will Labour MPs and others have the courage to give birth to another party? And having done that, what kind of a following will they have?
I know from inside sources that MLP do not have this database…besides the financial “mishaps” that happen in the glasshouse. Someone VERY close to MLP told me ThankGod Labour were not elected. If AS cant even manage the party accounts, let alone the country . They are in a financial mess not only because of a huge deficit but funds going “astray” and “salaried volunteers”.
Have yu seen and read alfred sant s parliamentary speech published today IS this man for real thus he live in dreamland or in Weirdo s paradise Oh my god what a close shave with this incompetent we had on the 8 th of march
But the PN do have a database, with people labelled from 1 to 5, and it’s useful to provide pre-election favours, like fridges and transfers.
[Moderator – Fridges? What you imply is that people people who vote Labour put more value on the acquisition of a fridge than they do on the prospect of seeing their party in power.]
An incompetent who nevertheless got a standing ovation at the conference thanking him for his superb leadership and reaching new negative records.
@Mark Vella
You are probably getting confused with the times when to get a colour TV (years after other countries I might add) one needed the signature of a minister!
Watching some of the clips from the MLP Ex-Gen-Conf on Bondiplus yesterday, really showed in what a dire state the MLP is. And thinking that this party could have been elected to power…….. !! How on earth do they want us to trust them at the helm of our country and at the same time they’re telling us that they could not organise an internal election for 19,000 members. As someone already wrote all they had to do was to split the ballot papers between their respective clubs………It seems that the word election is starting to haunt them. Cannot blame them, can we. Or maybe this time it would have been difficult to organise some hanky panky to pilot “il prescelto”. Their standards are to count the deceased, those abstaining etc with the losers but the positive ones – as described by DCG – would have realised it.
I see only one solution for this party to resurface – although very difficult to happen. This is split and clean itself of the old-guard, cannot do it attiude.
@Andrew Borg-Cardona – I have to say that you were looking remarkably slimmer on television. I must be dragged kicking and screaming into that low-carb diet of yours.
I think we are all forgetting that had the motion been approved and the MLP tessarati given the task to choose the next leader they would choose Joseph Muscat anyway. A few weeks ago Illum or Maltatoday published a survey that showed that JM was way ahead of GA in terms of popularity among labour supporters.
As regards the possible split, it will never happen. The new party will not have any resources (radio, TV, HQ, newspaper, local clubs) at all and will be seen by labourites as reducing the chances of the MLP winning an election. Small parties have no real chance of survival in Malta.
Daphne – the way you analyse is something unbelievable. Your perception is fantastic. I admire and envy your written power. Your analysis of who votes for PN and who votes for MLP is generalised, yes but PERFECT! Not only I have seen it happening all my life, but I realised it about myself. By time, I realised that my political sympathy went to the PN, because I wanted to do something in life. Something real. Useful. Prosit Daphne. As for the MLP now? My opinion is that there is only one way forward for MLP, and that is the same place where the Italian communists found themselves – out for Parliament. Malta needs an opposition sure! That is what democracy is all about. But, as long as the MLP stays as big as it is, and its only policies is that of destruction and fear, without ever giving one slight vision of where it wants to go and lead…Malta will keep on without an opposition. Sadly for the country, and good luck to PN.
@Amrio
According to Saviour Balzan on to-day’s midweek Maltatoday the Xarabank journalist on last Monday’s Bondi+ is Norman Vella, son of former GWU official Karmenu Vella, a campaigner for George Abela
@Ray Borg (sort of) I haven’t seen MaltaToday yet, so I’m asking for info – and what is Saviour Balzan’s point?
@Ray Borg – that would be why he spoke sense, then. Or haven’t you yet twigged that the only ones making an iota of sense are in the George Abela camp?
@ Andrew Borg-Cardona
Why are you so impatient to know Saviuor’s point? You were sitting next to Norman Vella on the show and he had you in titters with his theatrics. Be patient. Draw your own conclusions on Saviour Balzan’s point when you read his piece.
And God was sooo bored….so he created Malta. At the moment he’s waiting to see ‘Malta-Bag of Laughs’ Season 215
@ Daphne
I don’t know if we saw the same show but if I was George Abela I would’nt touch Norman vella with a barge pole. He is a liability with a capital L
@Ray Borg – I don’t usually buy MT Midweek and I doubt I’ll be buying the Sunday one much either – there are just so many rants I can take. I wasn’t laughing at Norman Vella, he came across as a genuinely concerned Labourite. If I came across as being amused by him, it wasn’t my intention, pjuttost a sort-of fond smile (God, that sounds patronizing)
@Daphne, whose comment on the new, svelte me I just noticed. Yeah right, and you really need to go on a diet, too.
@Andrew Borg-Cardona – yes, I know. I can’t risk having Jason Micallef spinning another load of fantasies.
@ Daphne Caruana Galizia
Pardon my delay in responing to your comment of last Wedensday when you asked me:”Or haven’t you yet twigged that the only ones making an iota of sense are in the George Abela camp?” Did you mean to include Dom Mintoff here?
Ray Borg: That may well be Mintoff’s only demonstration of sound judgement – though he is more likely to be motivated by dislike of Alfred Sant than by admiration for George Abela.