Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1428470
Saviour Balzan 5 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 14 NOVEMBER 2021 OPINION Bernard's fatal moment, Scicluna's transgression I am still trying to digest what exactly Benard Grech is aiming to achieve with his statement on abortion and the PN's stance on cannabis legalisation. Four days ago he said: "The abortion issue is a closed matter. This party was, is, will always be against abortion. It is a clear declaration I have made, that my predecessors have made, and it is our official position as laid down in the statute. Nobody, and I repeat nobody, as long as I am PN leader… will permit an- yone to be in favour of abortion and stay in this party or as a rep- resentative of the party." There was no window, no al- lowance for someone to be supportive of the PN while still being pro-choice. And it was surprising, considering that he sought to embrace the likes of Chris Peregin, the owner of Lovin Malta, as the PN's chief strategist. In May of this year Peregin said: "Unlike women in Malta, our politicians have a choice. They can either take this discussion to a viable conclu- sion, or they can abort it. Ironi- cally, they are choosing to abort it. And by doing so, they are tell- ing the rest of us, that we should probably not continue to afford them the privilege of being leg- islators." But beyond the fact that Peregin has ostensibly little if any influence on Grech's politi- cal sensibilities (or has probably subordinated his beliefs to the PN's exceptionalism, whatev- er that might be), Grech's Tal- ibaneque declaration on pro choice activists or candidates is a reflection of how unwilling he is to rock the boat inside the PN. It could also be that Grech can- not be someone he is not. He is after all, no ideologue from the right, an economics visionary, or a policy wonk with a politi- cal trajectory he wants to take the party on. Grech happened to be an affable and good com- municator whose popularity was carved among the TV audiences of Xarabank. He was a darling of the TV panel, evidently liked enough by the masses to be con- sidered a suitable pretender to the PN throne. But today as PN leader, by opting to block anyone who is remotely in favour of abortion, Grech has managed to alienate a group of liberals who, albeit si- lent, have always found a home inside the Nationalist Party. In the past, the PN's openness was a recipe for success. Now Grech is sounding like it's ok to push away younger voters for whom issues like sexual health and reproductive rights, as well as drug legalisation, are important issues. The other Grech cock-up is his party's stand on cannabis legal- isation. Certainly, it is unclear after weeks of procrastination. "The government wanted us to have a position on the mat- ter but we wanted to listen. We don't want to send a message that drug use is a normality," he said yesterday. But then he said that the PN had already accept- ed that the criminalisation of cannabis users had to be elimi- nated and that the party had al- ready agreed on it unanimously in Parliament. "We need to pro- tect young people and shelter them from difficulties and ex- cessive risks." But what exactly is the PN's position? And does the party understand that many young, as well as older people who use cannabis recreationally – and the numbers are not too small – had already welcomed the re- forms? Grech not only poured cold wa- ter on these reforms but deleted any form of support for the PN from this significant segment, once again ignoring the senti- ment of voters who want to be welcomed inside the PN. I can- not believe that the Opposition could be so pig-headed that it continues digging its own grave by making itself un-electable. It not only lacks vision but only shows an inexplicable desire for self-immolation. Gozo land grab Surely those who watched Archbishop Charles Scicluna live on MaltaToday's Facebook page last week found it interest- ing but also very sad. Scicluna had to face the wrath of protes- tors who gathered to show their anger and disappointment in the archbishop, whose renunci- ation of the control the Church could have held on a 17th cen- tury foundation, has contrib- uted to hastening the environ- mental disaster facing Qala in Gozo. Land in Qala is being devel- oped by a private company with the help of the mega-develop- er Joseph Portelli, who serves as a front for various local and foreign investors, because the Maltese church could have also failed to verify the claims by the Stagno Navarra family that they are rightful heirs to a 17th-cen- tury foundation created by a noblewoman. The Stagno Navarra family, together with former magis- trate Dennis Montebello and Gozitan lawyer Carmel Galea, paid €200,000 to the Maltese archdiocese to relinquish con- trol of a foundation – the Abba- zia di Sant Antonio delli Navar- ra, created in 1675 by Cosmana Cumbo Navarra – and replace the Abbazia's rector, a priest, with a layman of their choice, the lawyer Patrick Valentino. The Abbazia gathers within it a vast amount of land in Gozo that was for years controlled by a priest, appointed by the Arch- bishop as the foundation's rec- tor when the Navarra line ran out of first-born male descend- ants. The controversy is about how the land will be ruined forever and how the Church under Sci- cluna seems to have all too eas- ily accepted this state of affairs and relinquished control. Scicluna, not his usual bubbly self, told MaltaToday as he was leaving court that: "The decision of church does not have an effect on what happens to the land, as that is the responsibility of the state and courts." Cheekily he claimed that he was not aware back in 2017 that the land would then be used for development purposes. Well for starts, I do not believe the man, having on so many oc- casions before pontificated on how Malta is being ravaged by developers. Everyone in the Curia at the time knew that the people who paid the paltry sum of €200,000 had no intention of showcasing Gozo's pristine landscape, but of turning the land into a ce- ment jungle and fill their bulging pockets with more gold. Former magistrate Montebello and law- yer Carmel Galea are notorious in that sense, having already at- tempted the land transfers back in the early 1990s with the late Richard Stagno Navarra. The Archbishop could at least have broached a humble apol- ogy and asked for forgiveness for having made a fatal mistake. We would have absolved him... in the same way the Catholic Church absolves sinners for their transgressions in spite of all the suffering they could leave behind them. Archbishop Charles J. Scicluna (in car) leaving the law courts as Gozitans protested outside