Malta [European Journal of Political Research 43]

Abstract

For Malta, 2003 was the end of a very long road leading to accession into the European Union (EU). It is no exaggeration to say that the question of EU membership has dominated Maltese foreign and domestic policy to a significant extent ever since the application was lodged in 1990, and arguably for several years before that. With the date for the signing of the Treaty of Accession set for 16 April, the Maltese went to the polls twice in five weeks: on 8 March for a referendum on membership and on 12 April for general elections. The proximity of the two dates was not incidental. Not untypically, opinion in Malta on EU membership was split down the middle along party lines, more so than in any of the other nine accession countries. For the governing Nationalist Party (PN), membership had become almost an ideological tenet, just as non-membership had for the opposition Malta Labour Party (MLP). Although the MLP maintained that it was not anti-EU, and that indeed it planned to negotiate a special ‘partnership’ arrangement including a customs union with the EU if returned to office, the choice remained essentially between becoming members and staying out.