The Nationalist Par Leader Bernard Grech has resigned. A new leader will be elected.
The Nationalist Party has held a series of meetings yesterday to decide the fate of the Party following a disastrous survey result last Sunday.
Website Editor
Historian and Publisher
My 2 cents on a new PN leader. The ideal leader should have the following core qualities:
Strong Leadership. The leader should be able to make (or at least set the tone for) executive decisions. This quality should obviously not verge towards the extreme end of dictatorship. The leader should not be a hostage to diverging ideas and their promoters. Ideally s/he would be able to fuse those ideas into coherent policies.
Good values and well grounded principles. The leader should reflect the core principles of the PN. At the same time s/he must keep one’s mind open and adapt to a changing world. Age may play a factor here. An old veteran is unlikely to be flexible. Someone who is too young is also unlikely to have formed such values with a deep appreciation. (Obviously, individuals are unique and exceptions may exist).
Must be ‘clean’ and not compromised. The leader cannot have a history (or even be perceived of having a history) that includes corruption, misappropriation, malpractice, etc. Obviously, no person on Earth is a living saint. The ideal leader may have a minor skeleton or two in the cupboard, but should be able to disclose them immediately and cut a clean break from such past incidents without shame. If the shame would be too great, then the candidate would be far from ideal.
Charisma. The leader must be able to project hope and conviction. Whenever these are absent, then s/he must be able to create them in the hearts of followers and voters.
Caveat: It is unlikely that the ideal leader will have all these qualities from the start. However, the willingness to learn (where possible) and adapt is in itself a desirable quality in itself. Also as the political climate shifts and morphs, the importance of certain qualities will diminish and wax accordingly.
This is not a criticism of past leaders. I believe that past leaders have contributed in their own way. Bernard Grech, even though he had some faults, did exceedingly well in keeping a party which is under constant siege (funded by our tax money) moving forward and even slashing the majority by more than half at some points. His efforts must be framed in that context.
Ultimately, for the party to achieve bigger success, it must do more than change its leadership. The people who form part of the inner circle (core group, committes, etc)
are also an important factor to consider. The party needs to update its presence on the Internet and improve its social engineering capabilities. Some efforts have been made in this regard, but much more needs to be done.
The most important factor however, is the Maltese voter. One can practically lose hope that those that bought their citizenship will ever vote against those who sold it to them. These numbers, while small, are part of the majority which will never change its vote. As for the regular Maltese people (and to a lesser extent humanity), morals and values have unfortunately become more similar to those of the ruling party. In a world where even children compete with each other on social media for attention, the value we give to money has become inflated to the extreme and the temptation to make money in the short term (at the cost of our future selves and future generations) is the biggest carrot one can dangle in front of people’s noses.
So, will the prime minister call an election now?! Will he stick to his promise?
[…] in a very celebratory mood among friends after the Nationalist Party Leader Bernard Grech had just resigned. Borg is gunning for the leadership of the Nationalist Party with the backing of Adrian Delia and […]
Leave a Reply