Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1238298
9 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 22 APRIL 2020 NEWS ANALYSIS pushed the COVID-19 blame for the migrants' deaths from Malta to the EU. Expect- ing a radical reform of the EU's migration policies during a pandemic is nothing more than wishful thinking. He is keen on exploiting divi- sions in the opposition While Repubblika cannot be blamed for making a criminal complaint with the aim of en- suring accountability though an investigation of the army's and government's actions, it may well have provided Abela with a convenient punching bag. It provides Abela with a gold- en opportunity to expose rifts in the opposition, between the pro-Delia and anti-Delia fac- tion. The fact that the Opposition's justice spokesperson Jason Azz- opardi filed Repubblika's crimi- nal complaint made it easier for Abela to present the complaint as a partisan one. Opposition leader Adrian De- lia reacted by paying a courte- sy visit to the Armed Forces of Malta, a day after his justice spokesperson presented a legal challenge against its top brass. Surely this is no excuse for Ab- ela to present the army as some sacred cow immune from de- mands for accountability. But it may have been wiser for critics to keep the focus on Abela's own political responsi- bility, rather than give him an opportunity to present himself as a defender of an aggrieved institution. While Delia did take a princi- pled stance by insisting on the duty to save migrant's lives, his stance contrasted with the PN's media coverage of migrant boat arrivals often presented as a sign of government failure to keep the numbers down. Moreover, legalisms may also backfire. The European Court of Human Rights decision to turn down Repubblika's request for an interim measure for Mal- ta and Italy not to shut their ports to asylum seekers, ended up giving legitimacy to the gov- ernment's actions. While nobody is above the law, the issue of criminal re- sponsibility of individual gov- ernment and army members di- verted attention from the issue of political responsibility for the tragedy. It puts Abela back at the helm of his party after being side- lined by his own deputy PM Abela's response to the COV- ID-19 crisis has been so far lacklustre and overshadowed by the more prepared Chris Fearne whose self-styled "no-non- sense" approach managed to strike a chord with voters across the political spectrum, as con- firmed in last Sunday's Malta- Today's survey. Fearne even managed to an- nounce the decision to quaran- tine the Hal Far open centre in purely medical terms, without resorting to any stereotyping or making a political point of it. Unlike Abela, Fearne also re- sisted the temptation to score political points when faced by questions from journalists from the PN's TV station. This may have reinforced the perception that Fearne is more prime min- isterial in dealing with national emergencies than Abela. So Abela may well be trying to steal his leadership's rival thun- der by taking a populist stance on the migration issue. It gives him the opportunity to shape the party in his image Abela has consistently hinted at a stronger stance on the mi- gration even during the leader- ship campaign against Fearne, during which he expressed con- cerns on the impact of foreign workers on Maltese workers' conditions. Italy's decision to close its ports on the pretext of COV- ID-19 provided Abela with the opportunity of presenting him- self to the Maltese electorate as a strong leader able to stand firm on this issue without being singled out for criticism in Eu- rope for doing so. Moreover unlike Muscat, who used the pushback threat more as a warning shot to the EU, Ab- ela went further by not only in- directly effecting the pushback of the 47 migrants who were "rescued" by a private vessel and sent back to Libya, but also in refusing to respond to the hu- manitarian crisis which resulted in five of these migrants actual- ly dying and seven others being reported missing. In this way Abela may be more inclined to re-shape the Labour party along populist lines Although it remains doubt- ful whether such an approach would outlast the COVID-19 emergency his actions in the past days have reinvigorated bigots in the Labour Party. The failure to take any action against Alfred Grixti following his call to scuttle migrant rescue ships may well be interpreted as a license for xenophobic bigotry in the party. Reining these elements back in after this emergency passes may prove difficult. Moreover the economic slow- down may also reduce the need for precarious foreign labour, thus removing one major justi- fication for Muscat's cosmopol- itanism.