Malta: The Most Reluctant Nation

Like Gibraltar, the tiny, barren is lands of Malta have always been at the crossroads of history. There, 15 centuries before Christ, the Phoenicians set up a trading colony. In 60 A.D., the Apostle Paul found haven on a rocky beach near Valletta after his ship wreck, and in 1565 the Turkish invasion fleet was driven off by the Knights of Malta. More recently, during World War II, the Maltese withstood almost daily bombardment by Axis planes, kept Britain’s crucial Mediterranean sea lanes open. For 35 centuries invaders came, ruled, and were swept aside by new invaders; all the while Malta remained a colony.

Yet last week, when Malta finally became a sovereign state, much of the islands’ 330,000 populace viewed the prospect of independence with anxiety and even anger. When Britain’s Prince Philip arrived for the ceremonies, his motorcade was stoned, and at the independence day parade, mounted police moved in to break up a riot. When the Union Jack was hauled down from the Valletta parade-ground flagpole, vehement boos were mixed with the crowd’s cheers. Ex-Prime Minister Dom Mintoff’s opposition Malta Labor Party even went so far as to boycott the opening session of the islands’ Parliament — in which it holds nearly one-third of the seats.

The Laborites criticize independence as moving from “colonialism to neo colonialism,” want Malta to leave the Commonwealth and immediately close down the British military bases. Most Maltese, however, fear independence for just the opposite reason, since the military bases supplied one-third of all income, employed one-sixth of the labor force — and have given Malta a living standard far beyond its means. With the missile age eroding the strategic value of Malta’s midMediterranean location, they fear that independence can only hasten the process of decay.

Britain does not intend to leave its former colony high and dry, has committed $15 million to an ambitious five-year industrial-expansion program that has already created a small but thriving factory district in Valletta. But Malta is far too tiny (122 sq. mi.) and barren to produce enough to feed its dense population of 330,000. So Nationalist Prime Minister George Borg Olivier is taking the path of Malta’s history: loudly promoting the glories of its wide beaches, its ornate cathedrals, mosques and fortresses, and its 4,000-year-old ruins, he is looking forward to yet an other invasion. This one by tourists.