Simon Busuttil’s thoughts on his 2017 PN-Third-Party-Coalition

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1. 

   David M Briffa

   January 3, 2025

   As ever, a smart observation by Simon Busuttil. It was such a shame that he was beaten in 2017. He would have made an excellent PM and Malta would not have been ravaged by the Muscat/Abela governments.

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2. 

   Banquo

   January 3, 2025

   Simon Busuttil is 100% correct. Let’s recap.

   First of all, it is important to point out that Malta elects individuals to three distinct kinds of parliament: local parliaments (known as �local councils’), the national parliament and the European parliament. Although the vote counting for each follows the same logic (single transferrable votes), due to the differing structure of each parliament and the slightly different electoral systems, success in elections to one kind of parliament cannot be replicated in another using the same strategy.

   The most esoteric is the European Parliament. For this, Malta is one huge district and all voters get to choose from the same list of candidates to elect six people. The role of the candidates is merely to get elected. In the European Parliament, there are political groupings but no government and opposition. Due to groupings often reaching consensus, small groupings can find themselves voting with the majority very often. An independent candidate or a candidate sitting with a small political grouping can thus still be effective, and Maltese candidates contesting the EP elections can get elected if they are popular enough, as Arnold Cassola did almost twice.

   Local Councils, on the other hand, have governments and oppositions (the political party with the majority is effectively in government). They are also just one district within their locality. However, local councils have fixed and pre-determined numbers of seats. Popular candidates representing small political parties or merely themselves can get elected, as several did in 2024, and in previous elections too. The fixed number of seats can result in two big political parties having the same number of seats (a hung council), leaving third-party candidates as kingmakers: the ability to form a government, work on consensus-building, and even becoming mayors. This is how national parliaments in most European countries work, which is why elections are usually followed with weeks of coalition building until a governing majority is formed. This is probably how a more representative national parliament should ideally work, too, but that would require constitutional reform.

   For the national parliament, voters choose from politicians contesting on their district, and there are thirteen districts in total. For someone to get elected, she or he has to win their district. A political party which wins the highest number of votes in the country but not enough seats to have an absolute majority of seats in parliament is awarded extra seats so that it has at least a majority of one. This means that a party which wins the election will always have a governing majority. Third-party candidates who get elected on their own ticket will not only not have the chance to be kingmakers or prime ministers (as happens in local councils) but they will be relegated to secondary opposition (the official Opposition will be the large party which came second).

   Malta�s national parliament has a winner-takes-all system. Even the official opposition has few powers, let alone a secondary opposition. The only way for third parties to be effective is for coalition agreements to be fully formed prior to the election and the coalition parties running on the same ticket as if they were one party. This would require consensus and strategy, with the parties helping each other get elected. Thus, third parties can end up, not with a useless seat in parliament, but actually in government, which is what all political parties should aim to do.

   In theory, the next general election is an excellent opportunity for a new coalition to run. The Nationalist Party is doing better in the polls than before but it is still weak. Interest in the smaller parties is rising but they can get nowhere on their own, and most people hate voting for someone who stands no chance of being effective. Electorally speaking, the Nationalist Party and the smaller parties need each other.

   Obviously, everything comes at a price. The Nationalist Party would have to offer concessions to the smaller parties in its coalition on policy matters and the smaller parties will have to be offered some important ministries, maybe also the position of deputy prime minister. When they run, they have to think strategically about which districts small parties can make a difference in, and the Nationalist Party has to avoid bulldozing over the territory of its junior partner. This all requires mature discussion and consensus building.

   In practice, probably, none of this is possible. The small parties are seemingly ideologically the same but fragmented over personalities, and full of prima donnas who want to be the stars of the show and refuse to work with others. They speak of coalitions but either they do not mean it or simply have failed to grasp the electoral mathematics. Watching the progressive and environmental parties split into �splinters of splinters� (as Michael Briguglio aptly put it) is tragic. How can people who huff out of the room over minor disagreements work together in a coalition, and why should a bigger party or the electorate trust them to provide a stable government?

   The Nationalist Party, on the other hand, is probably overly optimistic about its prospects and thinks it can win on its own outright. Basically, the willingness and ability to work together is lacking, despite it making sense, and that will be the downfall of the third parties come next election, and maybe the Nationalist Party�s too.

   As a final side-point, the small parties should be open to having similar coalition talks with the Labour Party, but Labour is currently the government everybody else wants to replace, so that makes little sense pursuing at this point. However, if coalitions prove useful, small parties may have a fruitful, co-existing future with both large parties in the future. Maybe, in time, a truly great, umbrella party can supersede Labour or the Nationalists, but that is far, far in the future. For now, small parties need to work with the realities they face, and the PN/PD 2017 coalition is the model to build on. When people of good will meet, they can achieve great things, despite seeming limitations.

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3. 

   Cee Emm

   January 5, 2025

   Simon Busuttil makes it sound very nice and simple in theory, but in reality it is not as simple as he puts it. In the case of the 2017 elections it actually backfired badly as the PN was portrayed as very weak and Labour as an all powerful giant. This has contributed greatly to all the landslide electoral victories Labour won since then despite everything.

   Simon Busuttil had very good intentions when he was PN leader, of that I have no doubt. But good intentions do not make a good leader and unfortunately the PN suffered a lot of damage because of this.

   The signs were there. By 2017 the people were not yet ready to forgive the PN and their electoral campaign hinged almost 100% exclusively on issues such as corruption and almost no mention of bread and butter issues. Even I, a PN supporter and many other PN supporting people I know were sick and tired of the PN campaign and Simon Busuttil using words like Korruzjoni and Tixhim.

   Simon is a good person, an intelligent person and ambitious, but not a suitable party leader.

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   1. 

      Banquo

      January 5, 2025

      2017 is a long time ago. Just because the Maltese electorate was not ready for a coalition in government back then, it does not mean it would not vote for one now.

      The Labour Party (which was so successful at sabotaging Simon Busuttil) is not at its peak any longer, so similar tactics (I think Joseph Muscat was personally envious of Simon Busuttil because he is the complete opposite) may not work now.

      The Nationalist Party and third parties are on the up. A coalition now would find more fertile ground than the doomed 2017 coalition trying to take on Labour at the height of its powers.

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      1. 

         Mark Camilleri

         January 6, 2025

         Exactly.

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      2. 

         Cee Emm

         January 9, 2025

         Be that as it may, the Labour Party, its media and its trolls would portray a PN coalition government with ridicule and as weak.

         Another thing to note is that all over Europe we are seeing many coalition government’s not lasting very long due to major differences of opinions and other factors.

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4. 

   What should be the priority of a new government? - The Maltese Herald

   January 5, 2025

   […] referenced the history of Marlene Farrugia’s history of Partit Demokratiku and also uploaded comments by Simon Busuttil who lead the Nationalist Party’s coalition with Marlene […]

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