Deputy leader effect

Labour may still be leading comfortably in polls but could this change if the focus turns to the parties’ deputy leaders? Christian Peregin reports. After a year of bleeding, the Nationalist Party is pinning most of its hopes on newly elected deputy leader Simon Busuttil, who performed well on Xarabank last week when debating with Anġlu Farrugia (PL deputy leader for parliamentary affairs). Dr Farrugia’s performance has been widely criticised, especially after he failed to articulate Labour’s proposal to reduce utility rates – giving the impression he did not know whether water rates would also come down. Whereas in 2008, the PN pioneered the presidential-style campaign by pitting Dr Gonzi against former Labour leader Alfred Sant, it is now expected to push the PN’s Gonzi-Busuttil combo against Labour’s Muscat-Farrugia. Historian and one-time Labour general secretary Dominic Fenech says the PN is focusing on this strategy because the GonziPN slogan of 2008 had now become “tired”. Although it is the PN’s right to tailor their own strategy, Prof. Fenech fears Public Broadcasting Services will be used to the party’s advantage as he felt happened last week with the deputy leaders’...