Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1149911
6 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 31 JULY 2019 ANALYSIS JAMES DEBONO ON Sunday Joseph Muscat Joseph Muscat congratulated Opposition leader Adrian Delia for "beating [for- mer PN leader] Simon Busuttil" and called on him to get a grip of the party. He also predicted further trouble in the opposition party. "It's like when you're watching a series and you think everything has passed but then something comes up again and leaves you waiting for the next season". So what is the name of the PM's game? Muscat knows well that by reinforcing the perception that Labour prefers Delia to the "Busuttil faction" he is touching a raw nerve among a segment of PN voters who actually believe that Delia is Labour's Tro- jan horse in the Nationalist Party. Dispelling this im- age is one of Delia's greatest problems. By reinforcing this image through his sweet talk, Muscat is only making the opposition leader's task harder. Moreover any such insinuation makes it even more difficult for Delia to strike a balance between holding the government to account without constantly raising the stakes as his predecessor did with egrant and con- veying a sense of indignation when this is really needed. Muscat knows well that he would be far more vulnerable if faced by a moderate but hard- hitting opposition. Therefore by giving the impression of endorsing Delia he is actually giving him more rope to hang himself with. In this way Delia has to constantly prove himself with those who fear a col- lusion between him and Muscat in a way that Delia himself is forced to take more extreme positions fully knowing that Delia is at his worst when angry. It also increases the temptation for Delia to confront Muscat on social is- sues, which only end up splitting his own party base. Any praise by Muscat also makes it harder for Delia to offer a constructive criticism. Moreover Muscat also knows that for Delia it will be very difficult for Delia to get a "grip of the party." Surely Delia has been reinforced by a two-thirds vote in the party's gen- eral council. But the very fact that a third of the party's councillors wanted him removed shows that he still has a mountain to climb. While Delia has to reach out to the political middle ground, he still has to keep the party's more intransigent on board. Therefore he has to be both decisive and magnanimous in his victory. Yet Muscat will interpret any move at restoring unity in the PN as Delia's failure to "get a grip" on his party. Still while Muscat is characteristi- cally exploiting a weakness in the op- position and making the life of the opposition leader even more difficult, it is Delia who has to prove himself through his own actions. The greatest mistake for Delia would be that of reducing the strife faced in his party to a factional fight between him and the so-called Busuttil faction. In reality even more crucial for Delia is to convince a large sector of the elector- ate who have no nostalgia for the old PN but who still cannot see the oppo- sition leader as a Prime Minister in waiting capa- ble of leading the coun- try's government. Neither can they under- stand clearly what kind of change the PN can bring about in Malta. Why cheeky Muscat congratulated Delia for "beating Busuttil" Joseph Muscat knows that whenever by congratulating the PN leader he is only diminishing him in the eyes of a large segment of PN voters