Good morning, I hope that you have had a splendid weekend. It's been spiffing in Luxembourg, especially since we have had long periods of sunshine and unprecedented warmth. The park outside 22, Rue de Bragance was regaled with a wonderful shower of rays and showed off it's green glory as luxizens thronged into it's paths and children's voices joined the chorus of happy birds celebrating this early spring.This patch of bright sunshine was just as surprising as the news that Remich is flooded and that the citizens of that riverside town are busy pumping water out of their caves all over again.
This morning we woke up to a constant pissing of rain from the heavens but the long hours of sunshine stocked up during the weeked could not be so easily obliterated by this sudden change - even more so since we will all be cooped up in our offices and any extra sunshine would have gone wasted. There will be no raining on our parade. But enough about the matter... let us back to things Maltese and more particularly to the forthcoming local council elections.
Here at J'accuse we have oft pointed a not-so-bony accusatory digit towards the big fish in the electoral pool for throwing oh-too-many candidates at the electorate without separating the eedjits from the democratically electable. A letter to today's Times by a candidate Paul Aquilina (PN) does prove our point. Let me say that I do not know the chap in question - and that if I ever had the pleasure of meeting him he did not leave a sufficiently memorable mark on my mind for it to recall his face as soon as the name was read...
Anyways.. his letter to the times deserves the Lorna treatment... if only for a nostalgic return to methods past. Voilà mesdames et monsieurs ... the créme de la crème of PN candidates live from Malta in 2007:
Why vote PN
Paul Aquilina
[Do note the title. Could have ben phrased better no? I mean. Why vote PN? Yes. Why bother? Sometimes brevity tends to be the assassin of the spirit of the phrase (as Lorna would undoubtedly say). Why You Should Vote PN would have been less comprehensive but more comprehensible title.]
For the March 10 local elections the Nationalist Party will be presenting to the public a group of 121 ladies and gentlemen, coming from all walks of life
[Aha. Let the public be presented I say. We have ladies and gentlemen... it's almost like the opening of a circus... ladies and gentlemen of the public we present you the ladies and gentlemen of the candidates list... can you picture Joe Saliba with a Dali -like moustache and a whip?]. They include lawyers, notaries and law students, medical doctors, architects, accountants, businessmen, senior bankers, civil service officials, university lecturers and teachers, company directors, private sector employees, students, youths, self-employed, housewives and also a few pensioners.
[What? No Bearded Lady? I want my money back. Well... we have the butcher the baker and the candlestick maker of course. There's the lawyer, the notary and the half baked lawyer. Grrrrreat. Civil Service officials... wahey. Then there is the great set of hodge-podge employments at the end... Youths! Housewives! and the few pensioners thrown in! Jeezus. Doesn't the list smack of (a) patronising bull and (b) I wanted to come up with an iindicative list but then I did not want to hurt any of my fellow candidates so I mentioned ALL the jobs they do.. tenkjuverimuch].These people possess a vast experience
[That famous vast experience... I wonder how the Youths compare to the Housewives and the Pensioners?] as well as great intellectual knowledge
[Ta-da... it's the hunting season for Wankellectuals... here we have the lowest of the grades... not just a wannabe intellectual but one who has no idea what intellectual really means!]. Some of them also shoulder professional responsibilities in their line of work
[The others just sit around on their asses and get paid for doing **** all because they are blue eyed boys with the best pedigree!]. This group of candidates further enrich the PN in terms of quality
[Hmm. Enrich the PN in terms of quality - sounds like an artificial additive] and in its endeavours to guarantee serious management in local government.
I regret to say it is quite the opposite in the Labour Party camp
[ Opposite to what exactly - to having the circus of contestants? to having intellectually knowledgeable individuals? to having enriching factors to the endeavours of ... whatever?] where administrative and other problems during certain council meetings are not unknown
[Could a vaguer accusation be levelled? I mean what council meetings? Local Council? Aren't they made up of mixed councillors? And anyway... can you really say this after all that has been in the news?]. In my opinion the responsibility lies with the MLP leadership; only they decide who to accept to represent their party
[As against PN who accept all the flotsam and jetsam of electoral hopefuls so long as they shoulder their professional responsibility, are intellectually knowledgeable and write ridiculous letters to the times]. It all depends whether they want serious and professional people to run local councils, as the PN does.
[Does it? I mean... not to really really rub it in... but you are not doing a very good job of proving the contrary Paul!]We have read in newspapers of councils with a Labour majority facing huge problems
[True. And I have also read in the newspapers of councils with a PN majority making a whole cock-up of respnsible management too], even involving the police in one case
[Involving the police? How dare they? Did they ask them to help or what?]. We also hear about Labour councils squandering public funds and engaging in partisan politics
[Tut tut tut... PARTISAN POLITICS (read using John Cleese tone of voice)... .now what is that exactly Paul?]. We hear of councils refusing to renew the employment contract of employees simply because they are in some way affiliated to the PN as is their right
[IS it the right of councils to renew the aforementioned contract or is it the abovementioned employees who have a right to be affiliated to the PN? The question is intellectually knowledgeable of itself... it is also shouldering its own responsibility.. I think the question could actually run for elections in a non-partisan manner!].We also read about financial deficits incurred by Labour local governments, the inability to follow the correct procedures when awarding tenders, disregard to the Local Councils Act, confusion and situations whereby local wardens issue an excessive number of tickets.
It is the opposite where there is a PN majority; financial results in the great majority of PN-led local councils are positive with that of Gzira leading the PN group and ending the last financial year with a surplus of over Lm32,000.
[Tadaaaaa.... Gzira has a positive financial record hence all PN councils have a positive financial record].
Voters are urged to use their right to vote and choose
[Choose life] responsible and professional people, the like
[ OH no.... the like that are found] that are found in the PN list of candidates.
***
Mein Gott in Himmell! Unbelievable? Not really... it's run of the mill candidates.... And Aaron F should be thanking his lucky gods that I have not butchered his presentation of Youth Candidates for the local council. He is just as infected with this logorrheic mode of circum tauri for the masses. We deserve much more than this.
The management of the PN and Labour camps are under the general accusation of neglecting their duties towards the electorate when it comes to selecting candidates. J'accuse openly accuses the executives of the two main parties of thinking they can easily take us all for a ride by throwing this quickly assembled crowd of wannabes at us and hoping that one or two of them stick and manage a Local COuncil haphazardly for the next few years.
Shame. But at least we get our silver lining... letters like this are precious fodder for our Blog... just keep them coming lads! Ir-rebha taghna tkun!
On 10th March 2005 (8.25 pm) the first edition of J'accuse appeared on the internet. It was entitled "the Kinnie Generation" and was a trip into the unknown. Over two years J'accuse has garnered a little corner of faithful readers, interested observers and its fair share of critics. We look forard to many more years of blogging and hopefully increasing the role of blogging in Malta.
