Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/236916
3 News maltatoday, SUNDAY, 5 JANUARY 2014 Muscat 'nowhere close' to choosing new president THE prospective names for the next President of the Republic is being kept a closely-guarded secret, a prime ministerial aide said, refusing to be drawn into speculating on any potential successors for George Abela. "The Prime Minister has definitely not taken a decision on the matter," the OPM source told MaltaToday. But the sentiment inside Castille does not seem to be anywhere close to appointing a "unifying" candidate from the Nationalist camp of Maltese politics. When pressed to say whether the prime minister would take up Simon Busuttil's suggestion for a unifying figure that would follow on Lawrence Gonzi's example with Abela's appointment, the aide's reply was a terse one. "A candidate from the Nationalist camp does not necessarily lend itself to unifying. We could certainly speculate on names, but we will definitely not use the position for any political advantage." The mood at Castille appears to be in synch with what former prime minister Alfred Sant wrote this week about the decision to appoint George Abela as president by Lawrence Gonzi. Sant said that Joseph Muscat's choice should be final and not dictated to by the Opposition. "The balance has yet to be leveled after all those years where people who simply were not Nationalist-leaning, were set aside," Sant, an MEP candidate in the forthcoming May elections, said. Sant said the Nationalist government's choice of George Abela, who resigned as Labour deputy leader in 1998 after Sant decided to announce early elections, was down to "occult reasons best left unsaid" and as a palliative to the Gonzi administration's "limitless arrogance". George Abela was at the time recognised as a threat to the Nationalist party, who thought that his participation in local politics would serve to diminish the PN's own electoral chances. Abela was appointed a year after Gonzi was re-elected by a thin 1,500-vote, relative majority. In his New Year's message, PN leader Simon Busuttil hinted that the next choice for president should not be reserved for a member of the Labour old guard kicked upstairs, as has been common political practice. "It should inspire unity, as did the choice of George Abela," Busuttil said. "Unity should not be given just lip-service, but must be lived. It has to be built on strong values and principles," Busuttil said. The choice of president is taken by the Prime Minister, usually in consultation with the Opposition. But Sant said he was "annoyed" at the PN's insistence that since the last President was a Labourite, then the next one should be a Nationalist. "Before [Abela] the last presidents were from the PN camp. Correct though their behaviour was throughout their tenure, every single choice increased the scale of what was political divisive. What's more divisive than a government appointing its former prime minister as president?" Sant said, referring to Eddie Fenech Adami's appointment in 2004. Sant said that the discussions at the time, during which he served as Opposition leader, was that the decision was final. Lawrence Gonzi had first proposed George Abela for the presidency back in 2004, ahead of Eddie Fenech Adami, but Labour had taken an ambivalent, non-committal position on the choice. Abela's resignation was still a fresh wound at the time for Labour, then led by Alfred Sant. Abela had resigned upon the party general conference's decision to go for early elections. George Abela was Lawrence Gonzi's unifiying choice for President, but this has not created a precedent for Joseph Muscat to appoint a 'Nationalist' for president