Saving the World, One Article at a Time

Imagine the scene five centuries from today as wild-eyed mutant people sail the high seas Waterworld-style in search of juicy kelp and human flesh upon which to feast. On one of his many deep-sea expeditions, a gilled subaqueous scavenger chances upon the remains of Malta International Airport, where a handful of the fabled winged machines lie stranded in their watery grave. So much for the inflatable slide, a modern-day reader might be tempted to observe.
Through a little window he sees seated rows of putrefying bodies, little knowing that most of the ones toward the front of the plane already looked like that when they were alive. Drawing on his mutant strength, the door comes away with ease. The pickings are rich – casserole upon casserole chicken and beef, not to speak of a panoply of water crackers and processed spreadable cheese. Sure, dolphin and seal meat is delicious, he thinks to himself, but there is nothing like chicken to really spice things up.
But suppressing the excitement of finding so many dry buns and plastic packets of unsalted Danish butter, he reminds himself that what he is looking for is much more important.
“How did this happen? Who has the solutions? What could we have done to avoid this? This is what we seek,” he intones to himself, somewhat redundantly.
After all the years of searching, however, his day had come. For on this plane, of all places, was a surviving copy of The Times of Malta dated Nov. 7, 2008, tucked hermetically inside a pouch and held in place by the decomposed knees of a dead Foster Clark’s powdered drinks sales rep in row seven.
On the surface, a wise old man carefully leafs through the sun-dried parchment and nods sadly as the secret of what went wrong is finally revealed.
It turns out that the onerous task of saving the planet was entrusted into the hands of gibberish-spouting buffoons.
If it isn’t clear by now, it should be explained that we are dealing here with a masterwork of non-speak penned by none other than former Malta football team manager Pippo Psaila:

“True to its electoral promise of placing the environment at the top of the national agenda and its work plan for the next five years, the government, through the budget for next year, has, for the first time ever, put in place a holistic macro plan for the environment.”

Using up a year’s supply of punctuation, Psaila’s opens his manifesto for a brave new world doomed to drown in water and drivel with the kind of self-aggrandising style that befits his ilk. What managerial guide was he trying to read while holding upside down when he learnt phrases like “holistic macro plan”.
Woe to us that are subjected to this tale told by an idiot, full of claptrap and nonsense, signifying nothing.
To give him credit, Psaila is not shy of aiming high. The budget of 2008 aims to address no less than “global warming and climate change,” he argues, and shame on anyone who thought it was just a quick-fix sting on hapless shoppers and galoots driving cars that would be better suited to driving up and down Route 66.
Just in case the reader had forgotten just how holistic this budget is, Psaila is on hand to drive (environmentally) home the point:

“This is the first time ever, as far as I can recall, that such a holistic exercise has been launched…”

Read the article itself if you feel you have to, but rest assured that the most environmental thing to do with the hard copy would be to use it to line the birdcage or wipe your bottom with it, as people in Malta were forced to do in the 1980s. If you feel compelled to print the article out and use it as loo paper though, it is unlikely anyone would begrudge the compulsion.
The Russians used to do with their copies of Pravda, after all _ often out of choice. And the tone of that publication is what springs to mind when Psaila offer his laundry list on how the Party will save its people.
To précis one main points, the government will subsidise businesses to become more eco-friendly. But why summarize when Psaila himself puts it so succinctly in this elegant, flowing 91-word sentence:

“While advocating growth and economic regeneration, the budget provides key economic players with the right synergies to operate in an environmentally-friendly context where initiatives, such as the energy performance certification prior to the issuance of a development permit, the allocation of €33 million to promote the generation of energy from clean and renewable sources and the provision of €10 million for business and industry to invest in cleaner and sustainable technologies, combined with support for the compilation of energy audits for businesses, are all part of a very clear strategic direction.”

Moving on to transport, he rambles on pretentiously about how heavy emitters of “particulate matter” will have to cough up (along with along with anyone driving behind them) for their excesses. Again, he is too diplomatic to say that what he means is the Bob Marley-loving Ford Escort fanatics and assorted other working-class miscreants that will insist on driving only the cars they can afford to own.
And finally, Joe Citizen (his term) himself gets a look in:

“The possibility of exchanging high-consuming/cost domestic lamps for energy-saving ones through a voucher system is not only a far-reaching initiative but one that makes a difference in household expenditure and will go a long way to mitigate the announced increase in the utility tariffs.”

Although Psaila cannot compose a proper English sentence to save his life, he is cunning enough to shove the question of utility tariffs right to the end. Even then, it is casually dropped in almost as though it were a manifestation of natural will, as opposed to a policy endorsed by his visionary political associates.
The offer of providing Joe Citizen with a shiny, free light-bulb, a la The Sun, brings to mind that old gag. How many Belarusians does it take to change a light-bulb. “Vot is light-bulb, please?”
Is this shallow gimmickry and crass way to buy off the electorate with shiny trinkets, as though they were Native Americans trading their beloved land for pox-ridden blankets and coloured beads? Not according to Psaila:

“This budget has truly set the stage for what has to be Malta's future in energy generation and conservation where, through the initiatives announced, not only has the government come up with the first ever national strategic direction of some substance but has put in place those synergies to promote and foster a real culture change in terms of consumption and the source and application of our energy mix.”

The old man is indeed wise, but he has no absolutely no idea what exactly synergies are. Staring at the newspaper, he sighs ruefully and after a short while he sits back and smiles to himself contenting himself with the slim consolation that as bad as things might be, there is no longer anyone alive on the planet who will tell him that “it really is the case of putting one's money where one's mouth is and avoiding the usual rhetoric linked to topics such as the environment.”