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maltatoday | SUNDAY • 16 FEBRUARY 2025 6 OPINION The anxious travails of Malta's neutrality NEUTRALITY has to do with domestic as much as foreign policy. How we re- gard the rest of the world reflects and impacts on how we regard each other at home. Put simply, neutrality was never intended to build high walls around our borders. Looking closer at why the government and Opposition agreed to enshrine neu- trality in Malta's Constitution back in 1987, one begins to understand how this was a very domestic issue. What we make of that agreement now is down to us, especially when most of those leaders are no longer with us and our leaders to- day seem to entertain less of a clear posi- tion than their predecessors. 38 years ago Back in 1987, Malta's political scene was on the brink of collapse. A consti- tutional crisis led to deadly violence. It is easy to reduce this to a disparity between seats and votes. The electoral result was the last straw in a post-colonial process where Maltese society was still trying to redress the imbalance of power inherit- ed from centuries of foreign occupation. In that bargain, Karmenu Mifsud Bon- nici included neutrality and non-align- ment, to which Eddie Fenech Adami agreed. Neutrality must be contextual- ised within this history, and the main- stay of that agreement solidly articulated what happened inside and beyond Malta. The principles of neutrality were laid out and made public by Mifsud Bonni- ci on several occasions, especially to his Labour Party faithful. Bear in mind that in the MLP there was considerable an- ger towards an agreement which would open the doors for a Nationalist govern- ment. Be that as it may, neutrality became an integral part of Malta's history. It was never meant to be immutable, but the principles of neutrality remain founda- tional and as we reach the 40th anni- versary of that agreement in 2027, neu- trality still retains its strong relevance to what Malta's republic is all about. What has changed? It is interesting to note that by the late 1980s the Nationalists' ambition to join the EU was already made clear. Even when Mifsud Bonnici consistently op- posed EU membership, the agreement he drew confirmed how both sides re- garded neutral status as a building block for the next iteration of Malta's political history. During the Nationalist adminis- trations that followed, prominent figures like Guido de Marco who played a ma- jor role in foreign policy, were not only supportive of neutrality but used it to sustain the Nationalists' ambitions for Malta's role in the EU. Fast forward to 2025, history took its course and reframed the original con- text of neutrality. The Cold War is over, the USSR is gone, and new alliances are emerging. More significantly, Malta joined the EU in 2004. While this left the notion of non-alignment in a degree of ambiguity, neutrality was never put in question. Nevertheless, with the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and now with new twists in US foreign policy, we must as- sess how the case for Malta's neutrality needs to be asserted once more. Old fears Being in two or even three minds on neutrality does not mean that one can- not remain wedded to the notion of Malta as a neutral country in the EU. However, while this makes sense, those discussing neutrality on Malta's behalf must move away from the usual myths that have always formed our post-colo- nial imaginary. Often, vague discussions on Malta's status reflect a siege mentality con- structed and retold through the stories of the Maltese who enclosed themselves behind the walls of their cities to fight off the enemy. These all too quick analogies prompt the same old questions. Do we always need to be walled in? Should we form part of an alliance that takes over our autonomy so we can be safe? Those who make the case for being walled in say that actually it's because of foreign alliances that we were attacked. The oth- er side of the argument states that if it weren't for those alliances, Malta would have fallen. The same arguments were made when discussing Independence, the end of British military bases, and joining the EU. Neutrality is no exception. But to discuss this from such a position of anx- iety makes no real sense. Between wall- ing ourselves and making Malta availa- ble to the best power on offer leaves us nowhere in particular, especially when Malta already forms part of the Europe- an Union. Clear as mud Leaving aside the infantile shenanigans played in the Maltese and European Parliaments, Joseph Muscat's and Rob- ert Abela's foreign policy was never that different from Lawrence Gonzi's. During the Libyan civil war, Labour fully sup- ported the Gonzi government. A couple of weeks ago, Bernard Grech agreed with Abela on more spending on security and defence. There is no discerning differ- ence – in fact, both the PN and PL are as clear as mud when it comes to neutrality. Yes, there is a palpable anxiety, espe- cially at a time when Washington, Mos- cow, Beijing, Tehran and others are no longer shy of sporting their expansionist views of the world. But this must and should not put Mal- ta in a weak position. Rather, more than ever before, and perhaps because of the history that made Malta what it is now, Maltese democracy should become far clearer in its strategic understanding of its Mediterranean and European reali- ties. In my humble opinion, to do so we need all the tools we can get, and those would include both Malta's EU member- ship and its neutrality. How we use such tools is now up to us. John Baldacchino's latest book Secular Reflections: On a Nation's Anomaly (Midsea), is now available in all good bookshops. John Baldacchino is professor of arts education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the US John Baldacchino Bernard Grech agreed with Robert Abela on more spending on security and defence