Rights of the unborn
Isabel Stabile wrote: “It [the embryo/ foetus] is only a baby after birth, which is when it derives its rights” (November 18). By implication, she is saying that the “embryo/ foetus” – as she prefers to call the unborn – has no rights.
With this line of argument, Stabile and her pro-choice colleagues justify the deliberate elimination of an innocent, vulnerable human life because “it” has no rights. Only the woman who is carrying “it” in her womb has rights.
Like Stabile, I am also a doctor and, just as she had done, I, too, vowed solemnly on my graduation day to uphold the Hippocratic Oath.
Carmel Sciberras – Naxxar
Electoral boundaries
I refer to the report (‘Commissioners split on electoral boundaries’, November 24).
Some years ago, I had proposed that the whole redistricting procedure be revisited in a fundamental way. The constitutional requirement that all districts elect the same number of MPs was introduced in 1974, probably with the intention to mitigate against gerrymandering.
If the 1981 election result showed it to be inadequate in that regard, the constitutional corrective mechanisms of 1987 and 2007 made it unnecessary. Today, it’s a nuisance at best, a blight on our democracy at worst.
That things had to change became evident in 2007 when adhering to the formula required doing something as nonsensical as detaching Għajnsielem from the rest of Gozo and attaching it to the district on the other side of the channel. Unfortunately, this ‘solution’ has become typical with constitutional anomalies related to elections.
Today, except for Gozo, communities still have to be dismembered and reassembled into Frankenstein electoral districts for the sake of a mathematical formula.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Local government has now been an established part of the political landscape and our Constitution for decades. Unlike the current districting rules, it has roots in important social realities on the ground. It would make political sense to have the boundaries of electoral districts align with those of local councils and regions, introducing greater stability, clarity and, ultimately, accountability.
This would imply that districts will elect a different number of MPs, apportioned proportionately, based on the number of electors in a district. That’s hardly out of this world.
It’s what most democracies with multi-member constituencies do, including Ireland, the only country other than Malta that uses the single transferable vote to elect its national parliament. And it wouldn’t be a complete novelty: thanks to the constitutional adjustments to ensure majority rule and proportionality, five out of the last eight Maltese elections had districts returning varying number of MPs.
This is not a trivial matter. In a democracy, the link between representatives and the represented is sacrosanct to its political life. An arcane requirement that obfuscates that link deserves only to get the chop.
Clyde Puli – Qormi
Chilean degu is not a rat
I was just reading the article about the Chilean rodents (‘Unwelcome Chilean rodent joins the island’s rat pack’, November 19). They are not rats. I have five of my own here in the UK. My mother is Maltese.
These animals are the most precious thing to have and they have a strict diet – absolutely no sugar – and they need looking after. From what I can attain, the rodents (degus) mentioned in your article have been preowned and then let out to roam.
I attached a photo of my five girls. They are very clean animals and very sociable and, if looked after well, they can live for up to eight years. If it weren’t for COVID not permitting any flights (I tried two nights ago), I would fly across the continent and search for them myself – they need to be looked after!
They are not flea-infested and are never dangerous, nor bite. Degus are a joy to have, so I was disappointed in hearing they are classed as a problem like rats. They simply are not.
Maria Concetta Sampson – Lincolnshire, UK
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