"I will fight for Gozo's future," Gozitan PN MP Alex Borg declared. The irony is that Borg isn't even fighting for Gozo's past, let alone its future.
Alex Borg gained notoriety when his support for Fort Chambray's demolition was so spectacularly outrageous that Labour's mouthpiece, TVM, reported it with prominence and evident delight. The MP brazenly defended the concessionaire, Gozitan businessman Michael Caruana, stating that "the risk in terms of payment and implementation of the project will be carried by private enterprise". So it's fine then to dismantle his island's historical heritage. When Borg was asked why he thinks a hotel should be built at Fort Chambray he parroted the concessionaire's laughable PR - "It will be a five-star hotel that will maintain Fort Chambray's identity ... it will attract quality tourists".
Borg's use of the first person in his Times article betrays a certain God complex, a trace of megalomania. "I will fight for Gozo's future," he declared. Doesn't Borg form part of a political party? Why is he proposing to fight for Gozo's future alone, unaided, unassisted? An ego that huge sends alarm bells ringing, especially when it belongs to a novice first-term MP.
That same day Alex Borg was busy undermining his own leader and promoting himself. He was openly critical of his parliamentary colleagues with LovinMalta's Tim Diacono. Denouncing his fellow MPs, Borg condemned their "theatrics" in Parliament. Amidst Labour's assault on Karol Aquilina, Borg made Labour's mantra his own, accusing Karol Aquilina of "a lack of respect to the Speaker". Labour's media was relishing it.
While his leader was rallying the troops to stand up for his MPs' right to be heard in Parliament and against the Speaker's efforts to throttle the opposition, Alex Borg was engaging in friendly fire, blasting his own colleagues and pulling the rug from under his leader's feet. He even called the Speaker to apologise "on behalf of parliament". The junior MP thinks he's the father of the House, that he speaks on behalf of the whole chamber.
Borg was hogging the media limelight again just days earlier, spewing more of his ridiculous nonsense. He was praising Trump of all people. Borg had already endorsed Trump before the election. Why? Alex Borg declared that he admires Trump's "otenticita'". He meant "awtenticita" - authenticity. Borg is so convinced of Trump's 'authenticity' because Trump climbed onto a rubbish truck ("a Scammel taz-zibel", according to Borg) and because he wore a MAGA hat. Borg is an MP. His political judgement should be slightly deeper than a brainwashed MAGA Trumper's.
Alex Borg praised Trump because "you know where you stand with him". If there is any Trump trait that the whole world agrees on, whether friend or foe, it's Trump's unpredictability. Trump brags about it and wields it as a weapon with which to outmanoeuvre his adversaries. Trump is probably the most unreliable, untrustworthy and unpredictable leader in American history. He's changed his mind on tariffs several times in just one week.Yet Borg insists "you know where you stand with him".
It is of grave concern that an MP from a European Christian-democratic party endorses Trump - the man who failed the most basic test of democracy, refusing to accept he'd lost an election. Trump'sbig lie - that he won the 2020 election and that Joe Biden wasn't the legitimate President.
Trump paid a pornstar hush money to cover up his sexual relationship with her while his wife was giving birth to his son. He was convicted of sexual abuse and defaming another victim. He was convicted of 34 felony counts.
Alex Borg endorsed the man who withdrew the security detail of Dr Anthony Fauci, a man who dedicated his entire life to public health service and who became the number one enemy of Trump's MAGA mob because he wouldn't agree with Trump's dangerous recommendation to inject disinfectant to kill COVID. Trump vindictively removed the secret service protection for John Bolton, his former national security advisor, despite knowing Iran was planning to kill him, simply because he criticised Trump.
Trump pardoned violent criminals who stormed the Capitol on January 6th,attacking and injuring police officers. He's withdrawn funding for HIV treatment. He's attacking the free press. He banished AP from the White house for their refusal to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America as he ordered.
Trump is publicly attacking CNN and MSNBC and labelling them "corrupt and illegal". He's arrested, Mahmoud Khalil, a Green card holder and permanent US resident married to an American woman expecting his first child simply for leading a pro-Palestinian protest at his University of Columbia. Trump is planning to deport him. Khalil was followed by plain clothes US agents, handcuffed, bundled into an unmarked car and held in detention. This is not the behaviour of a democratic leader. This is autocracy at its worst.
Yet Alex Borg endorsed Trump and is still praising him. Borg's only concerns are the tariffs on alcohol Trump threatened to impose on Europe. Borg isn't worried about the thousands of people Trump sacked without justification and whose lives he ruined. Borg isn't worried about the people whose HIV treatment was withheld because Trump pulled their funding. He's not worried about the termination of USAID funding and its impact on the lives of desperate people around the world struggling to survive. Borg isn't worried about the global turmoil Trump's causing.
To look at Trump's indecencies, at his overreach, his defiance of the law, his contempt for the constitution, at his disrespect for women and his disregard for human life - and still endorse him, even praise him, is worrying. When the man glorifying Trump is a politician with oversized ambitions it's disturbing.
Alex Borg wants politicians to learn lessons from Donald Trump. Borg wants politicians to stop sticking to the rules and guidelines. Could there be a redder flag than an over-ambitious MP who believes politicians should break the rules? No wonder he admires strongman Trump.
In one of his self-promoting interviews with Tim Diacono, Alex Borg declared that MPs need to voice their electorate's views. If he truly believed that, he wouldn't be praising Trump. Only a small minority of Maltese voters support Trump. Most of them are Labour voters, only 36% of whom view Trump negatively. Maybe Alex Borg should be representing Labour. Or maybe he already is. Robert Abela is certainly exploiting Alex Borg's efforts to sabotage his own party.