MLP attempt "an attack on the country's democratic values"

Alternattiva Demokratika will be writing to the President of Malta and to Robin Cook, president of the Party of European Socialists, to inform them about the Labour Party's application for AD's spokesperson for European Union affairs, Prof. Arnold Cassola, to be struck off the electoral register.

The MLP is claiming that Prof. Cassola does not satisfy the legal residency requirements which would make him eligible to vote - a person has to be resident in Malta for at least six months in the 18 months before the publication of an electoral register.

In a statement yesterday, AD condemned the MLP's attempt to strike off Prof. Cassola, as well as "the insensible and anti-democratic attempt by both the MLP and the PN to strike off a number of elderly people from the electoral register".

In the statement, AD chairperson Harry Vassallo described the attempt to deny Prof. Cassola his fundamental right to vote as "an attack on the country's democratic values".

"The attempt to deny Arnold Cassola his right to vote exposes the MLP leadership's contempt for basic democratic values," Dr Vassallo said, expressing AD's appreciation of Prof. Cassola's work in the European parliament.

"Instead of recognising Arnold Cassola's valuable work for the country through his work as general secretary of the European Federation of Green Parties, the MLP is resorting to dirty tactics.

"Arnold Cassola is the first Maltese person to be elected as general secretary of a major European political family. Prof. Cassola has kept in constant contact with Maltese civil society while in Brussles. He also gave his contribution so that Malta gained the best possible conditions in the European Union. This is something which should make us all proud to be Maltese."

Dr Vassallo also warned that this move would not go unnoticed abroad.

"It would be unimaginable for a European social democratic party to behave in the same way as the MLP. Never in recent history has the secretary general of a European party been denied his right to vote in his own country. AD will make sure that European socialist parties, who are allied with the Greens in a number of European countries, will be informed of the MLP' s anti democratic antics."

Dr Vassallo also condemned the blatant abuse of power by both the MLP and PN, who are trying to deny the basic voting rights of Maltese and Gozitan citizens.

"Instead of recognising the contribution of the elderly towards the country, both parties are sending letters to these citizens in which they are described as mentally unable to exercise their democratic rights.

"The attempt by the PN to strike off a considerable number of Labour sympathisers off the electoral register just because they are over 80 years old shows the party's disrespect for these citizens. The PN's actions in this case are both insensitive and anti democratic. This is scandalous in a society in which respect for the elderly is a basic value. It is also scandalous and anti-democratic that people involved in social, religious, voluntary and political work abroad, could be axed from the electoral register by the MLP.