Mr Mintoff Rebuffed

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29763, 5 March 1962, Page 12

Mr Mintoff Rebuffed

For their defeat at the Maltese elections Mr Dom Mintoff and his Labour Party have themselves largely to blame. When they last held office in 1958, they proved impossible negotiators with the United Kingdom; and the suspension of representative government in Malta resulted directly from disagreements over the amount of British economic aid. Dr. Borg Olivier’s Nationalist Party, which refused nearly four years ego to form a caretaker government after the resignation of Mr MintofFs Cabinet, was only a little less unco-operative. In the succeeding years of direct rule by the Governor and a nominated Executive Council, both Mr Mintoff and Dr. Olivier continued their attacks on Britain. In July, 1960, the British Government appointed a three-man commission, led by Sir Hilary Blood, to draft a new Maltese constitution. The commission was boycotted by Mr Mintoff and Dr. Olivier; but it produced a constitution imaginatively tailored for Malta’s special circumstances a compromise between full selfgovernment and the defence requirements that must be safeguarded as long as Malta occupies its present place in the strategic picture. Until December nobody knew whether the Labour Party would contest the elections scheduled for February under the new constitution, although the Nationalist Party and Miss Mabel Strickland’s Constitutional Party had previously decided to do so. In spite of their own substantial reservations about the constitution, both the Nationalist and Labour Parties eventually made clear their willingness, if elected to office, to use the very real powers available to them in a governmental partnership with Britain. Moreover, the constitution could not be regarded as immutable, and Mr Mintoff and Dr. Olivier had the opportunity of pursuing their respective objectives of complete Independence and Dominion status for Malta. Mr MintofFs explanation of his failure at the polls is ingenious. He accuses the 77-year-old Archbishop of Malta (Monsignor Michael Gonzi) of conspiring with the British Government to defeat the Maltese Labour Party. It is true that the Labour Party’s main conflict

during the last three years has been with the Roman Catholic Church, and that the Church intervened in the election compaign. But because of the benign character of Archbishop Gonzi, himself a Maltese, it appears impossible—in the words of “ The Times ” “to see the struggle between the Church and Mr “Mintoff as the crushing of “a gentle democrat by a “ monolithic and totalitar- " ian authority ”. A pastoral letter read in Maltese churches three weeks before the elections did not brand support for the Labour Party as sinful in itself. Many parish priests, however, interpreted the strongly anti-Labour tone of the letter as implying a ban on Labour votes. Archbishop Gonzi is well aware of Malta’s grave economic difficulties, and he has not hesitated to criticise Britain when he has considered criticism to be justified. High-minded though the Archbishop may be, to anyone beyond Malta’s narrow shores the wisdom of making the real issue at the elections one of conscience was extremely questionable. For this reason alone, the elections may not help much towards solving Malta’s basic problems.