Tuesday, 24 September 2002

Firebrand till the end by Joe Grima - Joe Grima says Dom Mintoff is definitely a man worth listening to

The elections of 1980 were a couple of months away and, on the Prime Minister’s instructions as his special envoy, I arranged for a meeting in Paris between Mintoff and Francois Miterrand, President of the French Republic. It had been a long thorny road until the two could meet. Mintoff and Miterrand did not like each other at all. I think it would be correct to say that they despised each other. Yet in socialist circles it is customary for meetings to be arranged with other prominent socialists to give each other support at a time when support was needed. Mintoff was going into his third successive election since his electoral victory in 1971. One fine day he said he wanted a meeting with Miterrand. Miterrand never said no to the meeting but he certainly made it difficult. It was finally through the good services of Miterrand’s close friend and Home Affairs Minister, the former Mayor of Marseilles Gaston Deferre, that the meeting was arranged.

Mintoff had been invited to speak at a rally in which Miterrand was launching himself for the third time into the Presidential race. Twice before he had failed and it was felt that if he failed again that time he would be out for good. All leaders of European and Mediterranean socialist parties had been invited to Marseilles where the Miterrand rally was being held. Mintoff was the only Socialist leader in Europe and in the Mediterranean to be in power at the time. All other socialists’ leaders were in Opposition. Mintoff accepted the invitation to address Miterrand supporters but he knew from the word go that he would not attend. Instead he sent me to speak at this rally.

It was in Marseilles that I befriended the Mayor Gaston Deferre. In the two days I spent in Marseilles, he found the time to take me to lunch and as I left to return home I felt that I had come to know him well. When it looked as if the meeting with Miterrand was going to take long to arrange, I turned to Gaston Deferre and called him at the Ministry. He was then the Leader of President Miterrand’s kitchen cabinet, perhaps more powerful than the President himself. I did not now much about the power structures in France at the time so I just picked up the phone and called. No one would believe that I just called the Ministry from our Embassy and that Deferre had come on the phone himself to speak to me.

The meeting between Mintoff and Miterrand finally took place on the 19th September 1980. Mintoff took with him Edgar Mizzi, Alex Sceberras Trigona and myself. Naturally our valiant ambassador to France Leslie Agius, now director of the Institute of Mediterranean studies, was also present. The meeting took about an hour and we returned to Malta immediately after. I was very anxious to tell Mintoff what Miterrand had said after the meeting. I called an old friend from the French Socialist Party who was then at the Elysee with Miterrand himself. He said that Miterrand did not say much except that to his close aides he kept repeating that Mintoff was a man definitively worth listening to.

I watched him yesterday launching his new Movement. He has advanced in years but he is the same old firebrand I have known most of my adult life. His mind is crystal clear. His penchant for retelling history with his own evaluations and corrections is still very much with him. Whenever he speaks he still rules the roost and someone like my good friend David Agius would not have a chance of putting his own two bits in at any time. Mintoff would not dictate terms before but he would play the game his own way as he did yesterday. His ability to field ward off questions he doesn’t care for or that he does not want to answer is still there. With his passion and his conviction Mintoff still makes great television.

Like Miterrand I will say: Definitely a man worth listening to.


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