Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1499951
8 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 24 MAY 2023 NEWS NEWS ANALYSIS JUDGING by reactions on so- cial media, quite a few people were surprised by last Sunday's MaltaToday poll showing minor gains by the Labour Party and its leader Robert Abela. The survey came after a tu- multuous week in which the news cycle was dominated by damning revelations on the hospitals concession and Abe- la's predecessor Joseph Muscat. The survey still showed La- bour a long way from a 16-point lead it enjoyed at the beginning of the year over its rival, the Nationalist Party. That lead was slashed in March soon af- ter the courts revoked the hos- pitals concession. But in a déjà vu of the incred- ulous reaction in PN circles to the results of general elections held in 2017 and 2022, many keep asking 'how is it possible that Labour holds on to a com- fortable majority despite all the scandals which are devouring it from within?' Some even won- der whether Malta is a special case where electorates are im- mune to corruption. Yet the result of elections in Greece announced on Sunday evening suggest that Malta is not so isolated in rewarding a party plagued by scandal, but which is also credited for an impressive economic recovery. Victory after a national tragedy In these elections New De- mocracy led by Kyriakos Mit- sotakis, a scion of the Greek political establishment and the son of a former PM, beat the left-wing Syriza party of Alex- is Tsipras by a margin of 20 points. This was not enough to se- cure an outright majority and a run-off election in which the largest party will be awarded bonus seats, is now expected at the end of June. But the result came as a big surprise, simply because many believed that Mitsotakis would be punished for the major scandals which happened on his watch. Mitsotakis's popularity took a massive hit in March after 57 people died in an accident involving an intercity passen- ger train which was acciden- tally put on the same rail line as an oncoming freight train. The country was shocked up- on learning that the two trains had travelled for 12km on the same railway line, in opposite directions without anybody noticing. It was later revealed that train stations were poorly staffed and a remote signaling system was not working prop- erly. The European Public Pros- ecutor's Office (EPPO) also launched an investigation on the misuse of EU funds in a contract for upgrading the sig- naling system on Greek trains. In the aftermath of the trag- edy thousands of people, many of them university students like the railway disaster victims, staged rallies across Greek cities in protest against the negligence on the part of the government and the rush for profits in the partly privatised sector. Mitsotakis's government had already been rocked by a major phone tapping scandal after it transpired that Nikos Androu- lakis, head of the center left PASOK party, had been wire- tapped by the national intelli- gence agency. The case rekindled memo- ries of the surveillance of op- position politicians under the right-wing military dictator- ship in the 1970s. Concern on the rule of law in Greece even prompted crit- icism by the Socialists in the European Parliament who ini- tiated a resolution reprimand- ing the Greek government for its shortcomings. In response, the European People's Party requested a dis- cussion on socialist-governed Spain and Malta to be includ- ed too. But the resolution was later postponed by the Parlia- ments' top decision-making body comprised of political groups' chiefs to avoid interfer- ing in forthcoming elections in Greece and Spain. Row on opinion polls Still, with the economy grow- ing at 5.9% in 2022, tourism figures exploding and unem- ployment falling, opinion polls held before the Greek election still showed the incumbent PM steadily ahead by around six points in the run-up to the election. This prompted a bitter reac- tion from Syriza which called for more transparency on the part of pollsters, asking them to publish the primary data of their surveys. Tsipras even called on sup- porters to ignore the polls as party exponents insisted that it was not possible for the ruling party to see its support increas- ing, just a couple of weeks after the deadly train crash. Still the result was even worse for Syr- iza than the one anticipated in the polls. Greek parallels The Greek conservative victo- ry evokes parallels with the La- bour Party's victories in Mal- tese general elections in 2017 and 2022. The PL was reward- ed for its economic success de- spite grave concerns on gov- ernance issues and the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia. Although formally hailing from different sides of the po- litical spectrum, both the Mal- tese Labour Party and Greece's New Democracy have adopted 'business friendly' policies to promote economic growth and both have faced accusations of cronyism, collusion with big business interests, inhumane treatment of migrants, envi- ronmental degradation and hostility towards journalists. An example of the latter was the prosecution of four jour- nalists who had exposed the Novartis scandal; a racket in which the pharma giant alleg- edly paid bribes to Greek offi- cials, politicians, and doctors in public hospitals to boost prescriptions of its drugs. Novartis acknowledged its role in the scandal in two 2020 settlement agreements with the US Department of Justice and paid US$347 million in fines. However, the current Greek government politicized the af- fair, insisting that the reports about the case and the investi- gations into it were ultimately On Sunday the Greek conservative government ended up winning by 20 points over its nearest rival a few weeks after 57 young people lost their life in a railway accident blamed on official incompetence. JAMES DEBONO draws parallels between Malta and Greece asking whether electorates are becoming immune to scandal From Malta to Greece: Are electorates Kyriakos Mitsotakis's (right) victory in Greece on Sunday suggests that Malta is not so isolated in rewarding a party - and leader like Robert Abela (left) - plagued by scandal, but who are also credited for an impressive economic recovery