Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1208901
11 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 9 FEBRUARY 2020 OPINION of even greater defeats in future. But to carry on with the 1977 analogy: we can all see that there is an orchestrated manoeuvre to oust Delia, as there had been with Borg Oliver… …but where is the replacement strategy? Where are the equiva- lents of Eddie, Guido and Cen- su, lining up to challenge Delia for the leadership? And where are the plans for the post-Delia era… when the PN will still have to rebrand/reinvent itself, under new leadership, if it hopes to ev- er pose a real threat to Robert Abela's Labour? Nowhere to be seen. The only force that seems to propel the anti-Delia movement is a fervent desire to see the back of this man forever. It is an echo of the same 'Barra, barra!' motif that had characterised the Simon Busut- til campaign (perhaps unsurpris- ingly, seeing as it is coming from the same faction)… and, then as now, no thought whatsoever is being invested into two all-im- portant questions: a) how to actually get rid of Delia, and; b) what to do with the Nationalist Party when he's gone. This brings me to another ironic aspect of the timing. All this comes after the same 'Bar- ra, barra!' strategy had been used numerous times in quick succession... with spectacularly counterproductive results. It was only last July that Delia won a vote of confidence in the PN executive council, after an almost identical attempt (by the same people) to oust him. Ex- actly how this could have come as a 'surprise' has befuddled me ever since. Effectively, the choice was between Delia and an empty chair; and while I am the first to underestimate Delia's chances… I mean, come on. Even the late Spiridione Sant would have won, against no opposition at all… Either way, the challenge served only to strengthen De- lia's hold on the leadership… a pattern we had all already seen before. For the PN also seems to have forgotten all the lessons of its own past experience with Joseph Muscat. For over six years, its on- ly strategy to unseat Muscat was to simply call for his resignation over absolutely everything un- der the sun. And granted, some of those resignation calls were certainly justified – especially af- ter the events of last November – but then again, just look how that strategy actually panned out in the end. Throughout his six-year stint as Prime Minister, all such at- tempts at character assassina- tion seemed to have the effect of boosting his popularity in the polls. And besides: Muscat did eventually step down, on Jan- uary 12… and by February 6, Labour had skyrocketed in the polls, while the PN's popularity had nosedived to unprecedented new lows. Once again, the PN had invest- ed all its energies into demonis- ing Muscat, and none into plan- ning for the post-Muscat era: for all through the world as though Muscat's departure – and not the PN's own victory against him – was all along the only thing that ever mattered. But the strategy backfired for other reasons, too. Now that Muscat is finally gone, all that political capital can be seen to have been wasted. None (or hardly any) of it can be effective- ly used against Robert Abela… a fact which also partly explains the results of our most recent survey. Simply put, the PN cannot hope to defeat its opponents by simply denigrating them at every opportunity. It has to also come up with an alternative pol- icy vision... to project an image of corresponding strength and stability… to properly position itself on the political spectrum… to offer practical solutions to or- dinary people's problems… ...in a nutshell, to do all the things Eddie Fenech Adami had so successfully done after be- coming leader in 1977: back in the good old days, when the Na- tionalist Party still had a rough idea of what the word 'politics' actually meant. Granted, the PN's failure to do all this may indeed be Delia's own responsibility, as party leader… but then again, his opponents within the PN haven't come up with any real alternative to De- lia, either. They still hope to un- seat him merely on the strength of their own personal antipathy towards the man – as they've already unsuccessfully tried to do once, and as they also failed to do with Muscat – and not for any merit of their own. It is almost as though the PN is trapped in a 'Groundhog Day' of its own making: destined to repeat the same mistakes of the past, over and over again. And incidentally, one other mistake it is repeating concerns the long- term survival hopes of the Na- tionalist Party as a whole. Perhaps the most glaring flaw in the 'Delia-must-go' mantra is that it simply fails to address the underlying cause of Delia's un- popularity in the first place. De- lia is not the cause of the seem- ingly unbridgeable chasm that has now opened up between the various factions; he is merely a symptom. So whether he himself goes or stays, the pathology itself will still remain… and may even be exacerbated, depending on the precise circumstances of his eventual departure. On this, at least, there is one thing we can all agree upon: De- lia cannot possibly be the one to heal the party's internal wounds (not when, in the eyes of his crit- ics, he himself is responsible for many of them). But while his de- parture from the scene has un- deniably become a necessity… it is not an end in itself. To stand any chance of surviv- ing in years and decades to come, the PN will still need to confront the demons of its recent past. And it cannot possibly hope to overcome them, just by shouting 'Barra, Barra!' from the rooftops until its voice gives out. 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Carries out other administrative and clerical duties as required. Jobsplus permit no. 36/2020 Closing Date: 17th February 2020 Apply at: hr.la@landsauthority.org.mt https://landsauthority.org.mt/about-us/careers/