Abela’s nosedives – Kevin Cassar

‘At least four die of heat-related issues over weekend’ ran the headline. Its subtitle was ‘Reports of several people seeking help, especially the elderly’.

‘Power cut at Mater Dei’, ran another. When the electricity at the country’s main hospital cut out, the generators didn’t kick in for almost an hour, sparking chaos.

Health Minister Chris Fearne had rejected the Opposition’s request for an urgent parliamentary sitting to discuss the interminable blackouts, labelling it “a partisan move”.

The same thing happened at Mount Carmel Hospital just days before. When the hospital lost power, generators failed to kick in, compelling staff to resort to mobile phone torches to do their work.

‘Patients were screaming, panicking and shouting’, The Times reported. Nobody can imagine the circumstances at Mount Carmel where patients with the most severe mental health conditions found themselves in utter darkness and stifling heat in a locked environment.

The Times asked the Health Ministry some hard questions. What are you doing about this? “The Ministry has asked Mount Carmel Hospital’s administration to present an incident report…and to ensure it is not repeated,” was the pathetic reply.

You see, it’s the hospital administration’s fault, nothing to do with the Minister.  Or maybe it’s the Nationalist Party’s fault. “We are doing all this to strengthen an electricity system that a Nationalist government had left completely abandoned,” Fearne wrote in his letter to the Speaker.

Could somebody please remind the deputy prime minister that his party has been in government for over a decade? “We understand the inconvenience many people have gone through,” Fearne remarked.

Inconvenience? You’d think those deaths caused by the heat were just a minor bus delay. You’d think the thousands of euros in spoilt refrigerated stock were just a deterioration in the sound quality on your radio. You’d have thought the millions of euros in lost business and damaged appliances were just an unpleasant odour in your neighbourhood.

But when things couldn’t get any worse, they rapidly deteriorated further. “Now it’s the water supply which is being interrupted” read another report on Tuesday 25 July.

The Water Services Corporation notified residents in Gharghur, Naxxar, Iklin, Swieqi, Madliena, Mosta, Gzira and San Gwann that their water supply had been interrupted due to a technical fault. San Gwann had just endured seven days and six nights without power during the hottest few days in decades.

Two major water pumping stations in Naxxar and Siggiewi went offline on Monday night as a result of power cuts, leaving more residents and businesses in various localities without water.

That was less than 24 hours after Enemalta bragged that “the electricity supply was restored to all customers affected by the high voltage cable faults.”

Two days later the Times of Malta reported that milk shortages are on the way due to power cuts.  Malta’s biggest dairy producer warned that “due to an electricity outage at the factory, the company is experiencing difficulties maintaining usual milk production levels which in turn may impact the availability of certain products’. Whole swathes of the country remained in the dark.

The previous day,  Prime Minister Robert Abela had announced on ONE that “the power situation around the country has returned to normal (repristinata).

As always, Abela lives in his own ivory tower where electricity never fails. For him nothing’s wrong, everything is in “pristine” order, and whatever isn’t in order is the PN’s fault. So as he did with Sofia’s public inquiry, Abela rejected the Opposition’s request for parliament to meet.  Fearne vilified the opposition accusing it of making a “partisan move”.

He reminded the public that they should be grateful to Labour because “the government offered energy subsidies” saving the people “400 million in total last year”.

Instead of dying down, the public anger intensified. So Abela resorted to his usual trick – the one that always works. He promised the public more cheques. We’ll compensate you if you behave.

“Government and Enemalta are working on a compensation system for loss of perishables and faults sustained by electrical appliances,” he commented.

This time his trick didn’t work. The rest of the country joined the clamour for government to act.  ADPD called for the people to protest.

Malta’s Chamber of Commerce requested an urgent MCESD meeting. The Chamber expressed its serious concerns stating that it was “very worried about the current situation the country is in, particularly, though not only, about the nationwide power outages experienced continuously over the past days which left businesses and the public in paralysis”.

It demanded that the MCESD convene urgently to discuss the disastrous situation “collectively as a nation”.  “This goes beyond power cuts”, the Chamber commented, “there is an urgent need to discuss the way that crucial issues impacting the nation as a whole are being handled”.

In short, the country is fed up with Abela’s incompetence.

So what did Robert Abela do? He asked the MCESD chairman to summon social partners to meet, making absolutely no mention or reference to the fact that the Chamber had already done so.  As he did with the Sofia public inquiry, Abela suddenly placed himself at the front of the revolt.  It was Robert Abela all along who requested the MCESD meeting – and nobody else – just as it was Robert Abela who always wanted the public inquiry into Sofia’s death.

Abela never learns.

At the Jean Paul Sofia vigil, he walked out of Pinto’s baroque entrance of the Auberge de Castille expecting the crowd’s adulation and gratitude for belatedly calling a public inquiry.  He was met with jeers, having to be spirited away by police and security for his safety.

Now he’s done the same. He’s pretending to have called the MCESD meeting himself.  If he thinks he’ll get a hero’s welcome there, he’s very much mistaken.

The Chamber has read right through him – “the country is in a nose-dive and we persist in denial, failing to read the signs of the times”.

They’re referring to you, Robert Abela.