Opinion: What Maltese Politicians Should Learn About Authenticity From Trump’s Victory
In terms of sheer political speaking style, there’s a lot that our current crop of politicians can learn from Donald Trump’s rise from the ashes.
While following the US election as a passive observer, I noticed that Trump kept coming off as authentic.
His speeches and public appearances were chaotic, sensational, even rambling at times, but they felt real. When listening to Trump, I just got the sense that he was truly speaking from the heart and not following some kind of script his advisors laid out for him. This was clearest when he agreed to speak for three hours on Joe Rogan’s podcast, which is renowned for frank and open discussions.
There didn’t seem to be any fear that his comments could put off potential voters or disrupt his own campaign narrative; for all intents and purposes his straightforward and unpredictable approach was the narrative.
What you are seeing is what you will get – like it and vote for him or dislike it and vote for his opponent or stay at home.
For someone used to the heavily scripted style of Maltese politics and with political parties obsessed with trying to control the narrative, Trump’s approach just seemed like a breath of fresh air.
With a few exceptions, local politicians are fixated on trying to please as many people as possible, an approach that has neutered them into administrators of perceived public opinion, rather than leaders.
This is why Robert Abela U-turns at the slightest sign of public disgruntlement and why Bernard Grech merely piggybacks on what pressure groups propose rather than carve his own way forward.
Add that to the parties’ focus on ensuring everyone sings from the same hymn sheet and a fear that outliers will be ostracised, and you can never be sure what the individual politicians actually think.
What is missing is authenticity, something which is even more important in this new age of infinite content, where bland and vague messages get drowned out and where controlling a narrative has become pretty much impossible.
Trump’s victory showed that, unlike what we have been repeatedly told in Malta, authenticity doesn’t have to be political suicide. It can actually be a winning strategy.
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