Sticking to the facts

Speaking to The Times (January 12), the MLP's secretary general, Jason Micallef, sees nothing wrong in insisting on trying to disenfranchise over 1,800 voters and seems deaf to all appeals to see reason. That is clearly the MLP's right to do so by law.

However, Mr Micallef should perhaps explain to the electorate how, as a party which is now in favour of Malta's membership of the European Union and, therefore, supposedly accepting the basic tenet of free movement of persons between member states, the MLP now wants to remove the right to vote of Maltese citizens who work or study abroad.

The MLP is trying to remove the most basic of democratic rights of a significant number of Maltese and Gozitans while, ironically, non-Maltese EU citizens residing in Malta will be entitled to vote and contest elections for the European parliament in Malta. The MLP cannot have the cake and eat it. If it really believes in EU membership for our country than it should dump archaic practices and show that it truly believes in the high democratic standards demanded by the EU for all of its citizens. This should be done through concrete actions and not just by paying perfunctory lip service for electoral expediency.

Mr Micallef should also stick to the facts. Alternattiva Demokratika is not jumping on any Nationalist Party bandwagon since AD has over the years consistently criticised both the PN and the MLP whenever they resorted to the legal shenanigans we are now witnessing once again.

With regards to Arnold Cassola's court appearance, Mr Micallef is also factually mistaken. Prof. Cassola did in fact produce his current passport in court, not as alleged by Mr Micallef.

Mr Micallef also conveniently ignores the sentence handed down by Mr Justice Tonio Mallia in March 2003 in the case "Harry Vassallo vs the Chief Electoral Commissioner and Jimmy Magro" which is a veritable legal earthquake in its interpretation of the residence requirements for Maltese voters so often cited by the MLP.

AD invites anyone whose vote is being challenged by the other political parties, in this case the MLP in particular, to use this court sentence to challenge such anti-democratic arrogance. Anyone interested in obtaining an electronic version of this sentence may e-mail me at cachia@maltanet.net.