Choosing choice - Manuel Delia

European elections, even in Malta, attract somewhat less keen interest and lower participation than national elections. Local elections even less. The stakes are perceived to be lower, certainly for that substantial minority who are as keen about their party winning at every opportunity as the average resident of Kerċem is consumed with passion about which harbour town wins this year’s September regatta.

For a chunk of voters who would have typically in the past voted PN, there are reasons other than apathy or indifference that have given them reason to wonder whether this should be the time they stay home. Not voting out of indifference is not quite the same as not voting out of choice. Though the effect is indistinguishable.

I have spent years campaigning for the PN, exhorting those who threaten to abstain with the handbook reasons why you should always vote. And yet, I confess, the silence of the god of hope and inspiration has cast me in deep doubts about my vocation as a participating citizen of a democracy.

Let’s think this through.

And let’s start with local elections. For everyone except the most intimately involved – typically party activists working throughout the...