Opinion: Freedom fiction

Robert Abela was busy rewriting history.  He hailed Dom Mintoff’s decision ”to secure Malta’s freedom the best decision any politician has taken in our history”.  Mintoff took no such decision.

The prime minister either has no clue about history or was just pushing Labour’s big lie that  Mintoff kicked the British forces out of Malta because he valued “peace and neutrality”.

Mintoff wanted more money from Britain and other NATO nations to allow Malta to continue serving as a military base. He wasn’t remotely interested in peace or neutrality.

Mintoff wanted the money.  He tried playing the tough negotiator to extort more millions. He wasn’t driven by any principles or desire for peace.  What really happened is that Mintoff overplayed his hand, and the British decided to pull out.

In typical belligerent style, Mintoff sent the British a threatening ultimatum on Christmas Day, demanding an additional $11 million to allow Malta to remain a military base.

He wasn’t fussed about having destroyers in the Grand Harbour, as Robert Abela falsely suggested in his Sunday sermon.  Mintoff wasn’t queasy about lethal weapons in our ports.  He just wanted more money.

Mintoff spent six months in tortuous negotiations with the British government.  By September 1971, it looked like he’d reached an agreement on financial terms.  The British believed a deal had been struck with Mintoff, but, as was his style, he went back on his word, according to a report in The New York Times.

Yet Ted Heath, the British Prime Minister at the time, was even more blunt than Mintoff. He resented what he considered Mintoff’s attempt to blackmail him, swiftly ended the exchange, and decided to withdraw the nation’s forces.

Mintoff tried to force Heath to reconsider, by threatening to allow Soviet ships to use Malta.  Just days after the British announced they would not extend the lease for their Malta naval base, Mintoff announced a new trade agreement with the Soviet Union to put pressure on Heath.

By then, however, many strategists no longer considered naval bases of great significance. One British source was asked whether Russian use of Malta as a naval base would worry him. The reply came back, “Yes, but not $11 million worth.” That was the sum Mintoff was demanding over and above the agreed payment.

When he came to power in June 1971, Mintoff immediately demanded a renegotiation of the treaty signed in 1964, which allowed the British to continue to use Malta as a naval base against payment. Mintoff didn’t seek to terminate the lease. He didn’t even allude to any aspiration to become “neutral.” Quite the contrary.

He brandished his intentions to seek closer connections with Moscow and with Muammar Gaddafi’s revolutionary regime in Libya as a means of forcing Britain’s hand.  So much for neutrality.

The British had been paying £5 million for use of naval and military facilities in Malta, then the equivalent of around $13 million.  Mintoff wanted six times more. He demanded $78 million.

When he realised nobody was taking him seriously, he reduced his price to $47 million.  Does that sound like a man trying to “secure Malta’s freedom”? Is that “the best decision any politician has taken in our history”? That’s the distorted narrative Robert Abela was shoving down his loyal supporters’ throats.

Mintoff was so desperate to strike a deal that he travelled to Britain to meet Prime Minister Heath at Chequers.  There, they reached an understanding that Malta would receive an annual rent of just under $26 million, with other NATO countries helping Britain fork out that sum.

Britain agreed to pay half that figure immediately, covering six months’ rent in advance, which it did on 30 September 1971.  The two countries also agreed to start negotiations on a long-term treaty, and Mintoff negotiated with other NATO countries for additional funds.

Mintoff secured offers totalling $18 million in economic aid but Mintoff rejected them because he wanted money in cash. The man Abela claims was so determined to secure Malta’s freedom was travelling around selling his country as a military base to the highest bidder.

Meanwhile, Mintoff was also negotiating with the British on the long-term lease of the country for military purposes.  British Defence Secretary Lord Carrington offered to fly to Malta on December 16 and 17 for face-to-face discussions with Mintoff.

Mintoff thought he could bully the British into paying more.  On Christmas morning, he sent an ultimatum to the British government demanding the additional $11 million dollars and threatening to kick the British out by 31 December –  just six days later – a logistical impossibility.

The British government again replied to Mintoff’s Christmas card by offering to send Carrington to Malta.  Mintoff arrogantly repeated his Christmas demand.  The British government immediately decided to break off all negotations with Mintoff.

Ted Heath set out plans to withdraw the British forces slowly, with all their stores and equipment. Britain had called Mintoff’s bluff.

Mintoff flew into a panic. As the date of the final pull-out of British forces approached, he frantically sought to avoid economic collapse.  He turned first to Ghaddafi, then to the Chinese and others.

Libya loaned Malta ¢6.5 million, and then another $3 million.  It bought a major share in the Jerma Palace Hotel. It provided $500,000 for hospital modernisation.  It purchased St Michael’s College for $1 million dollars.

The Chinese financed a $40 million loan to construct the Red China Dock.

According to declassified documents, Mintoff pleaded with British prime minister James Callaghan to attend the 31 March 1979 ceremony. Callaghan turned Mintoff down.

Freedom Day wasn’t “the best decision any politician has taken in our history”, as Robert Abela asserted.

It was just another of Mintoff’s catastrophic blunders, one which turned Malta into Libya’s beggar and left Malta isolated for years, struggling with crumbling infrastructure, unemployment, a lack of foreign investment and brutal repression backed by a secret agreement with North Korea to provide Mintoff weapons and ammunition “free of charge”.

That was Mintoff’s idea of peace and neutrality.