‘Labour pandered to developers and businesses’ – veterans

Professor Dominic Fenech has criticised the Labour Party’s strategy, as well as Jason Micallef, in comments on social media in the wake of the loss of votes that the Party experienced in the European Parliament elections.

Fenech, the Head of Department of History and Dean of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Malta, was Secretary General of the MLP in the 80s.

He said on Monday morning, as results showed the Labour Party lost 32,000 votes, that the Party had pandered to developers and businesses over the public good.

In comments beneath his post, Fenech added the Party would continue to face the same issue because those who created the problem will be the ones proposing solutions.

He said there was a middle ground that Labour should seek. He was replying to Labour supporter and campaign activist Jackie Mercieca, who defended Labour’s record, saying the Party in government could not have done more.

“For good to be done, we don’t need to ruin our environment so businessmen continue to profit while the public swears at the inconvenience… I can give you a million examples of how public interest is subject to business interests,” Fenech said.

Fenech also criticised Jason Micallef, rubbishing his analysis of why Labour lost so many votes. At the top of Micallef’s list was the fact that he was not involved at all.

Micallef aligned himself with disgraced former prime minister Joseph Muscat in the lead-up to the elections, appearing in court to support him when he was charged with bribery, fraud, and money laundering in relation to the hospitals’ deal only two weeks ago.

Fenech was not the only Labour supporter who criticised the Party’s strategy. In a social media post, Martin Debattista, a former journalist at Labour’s media and a senior lecturer at the University, said the result was “a win for those Labourites sidelined, for those angry at how they were taken for a ride by Joseph Muscat, who insists on being a hero while playing the victim after he dismantled good governance.”

“Voters do not want a Party held hostage to the recent past… in which the Labour Party, instead of keeping its distance from these very serious accusations, attacked the judiciary to defend Muscat and his clique.”

Criticism also came from those at the centre of scandals that analysts say cost the Labour Party votes, like former PL MP Silvio Grixti, who faces charges in court over the social benefits racket.

On Facebook, Grixti said Prime Minister Robert Abela’s expressions about receiving the public’s message with humility were false. “One is born and raised humble; the rest is false,” he said.

Grixti is among those facing charges of organising and forming part of a criminal organisation, defrauding the Department of Social Security of an amount in excess of €5,000, forging official documents that entitle holders to payment and knowingly making use of such documents.

Even former Labour MEP Marlene Mizzi criticised “a particular MP”, saying he was trying to gain 100 votes for himself in his constituency while losing 1,000 votes for the Party, in what seems to be a reference to Housing Minister Roderick Galdes and the illegal registration of voters residences in Siggiewi while the apartments were uninhabitable.

In May, Housing Minister Roderick Galdes ordered that former Labour MEP Marlene Mizzi be removed from the Chair of Malita Investments, one of the government entities implicated in electoral fraud and gerrymandering in Siggiewi, and replaced with someone closer to the minister.

As Labour licks its wounds, there is a feeling of hope among the public that it sent the right message about the change in politics needed.