The devastating effects of a marriage of convenience

Pauline clutched her mug of coffee nervously. Any 18-year-old bride-to-be would be nervous but in her case the nerves were caused by fear.

The "matchmaker" was finding her a partner from her extensive waiting list but this was not a romantic match; it was a marriage of convenience to a man who only wanted a Maltese passport.

Her heart-rending story started a few years before.

Pauline had been devastated by the death of her mother and the teenager had fought bitterly with her father. She felt the only way out was to escape and she ran away from home, spending time at various places. Then only 16, she had no work and eventually found herself - via a social worker - at a shelter for the homeless in Paola, where some members of the Labour Party club bar looked after her. In spite of their kindness, she only stayed three months.

"It was a really creepy, scary place to live in."

Pauline readily admits she turned to drugs, desperate to escape the dreary reality of her life. Others at the house did the same, with tragic results. Of the six that lived there, one was a drug abuser, one a gambler, and one had been thrown out of home.

"I wonder if any of them are still alive. I doubt it."

She found a place to live in and scraped together some work but not enough to pay the rent. "I could not turn to my father. I didn't think he would take me back," she said.

She was the perfect prey: young, lonely, poor, addicted, suicidal. It wasn't long before she was approached by a shady "friend". Did she want to make a quick Lm800?

She was assured it was easy money. She was taken to the matchmaker's house and sat in her grimy kitchen, too dazed and frightened to ask too many questions. The chubby woman, in her 30s, hollered at her kids, who were clamouring for attention, one hand on her pregnant belly.

"She told me she had already been through it twice herself, as a way of reassuring me that it was as easy as she claimed."

The right match was found.

All she needed to do was marry a Syrian in his 40s who had been working illegally in Malta. It would be just a quick ceremony at the public registry, that's all. After that, they would never have to meet again. She'd get the money, he'd get the freedom of movement and the matchmaker would cross one other person off her list. Oh, and Lm1,800: her fee for getting them together.

Pauline agreed. She didn't really think she had any choice and it was certainly a far less unpleasant option than some of the others she had been offered.

She met her betrothed in Valletta. He was accompanied by his girlfriend, another illegal immigrant who was herself marrying a Maltese as a ticket to exempt status - a work permit for all intents and purposes.

He seemed pleasant enough but Pauline got cold feet. What was she getting into, she wondered. She tried to pull out of the agreement but a few menacing threats from the matchmaker soon made her realise it was too late. The ceremony at the public registry office was brief and impersonal.

"I wasn't asked anything at all. This is what amazed me."

The marriage went ahead but most of the money she was promised did not materialise.

"The matchmaker had told me she would help me if I ever needed anything or to help me get the separation - after a few months. But she never did. All she cared about was getting her money," she said bitterly. "She is not exactly the kind of person you go to argue with..."

Desperate once more, Pauline had few friends to turn to. Her husband's girlfriend offered her a room in their house. "We became real friends. It was strange thinking that I was married to that man when she was his girlfriend; but I had somewhere to live and, after all, I had never slept with him. He was a husband in name only."

It was not as cosy as it sounds: Her husband threatened to make her pay back all the money he had shelled out if she tried to get a separation.

It was far from ideal, but at least it was stable. Her husband continued to work, employing other illegal immigrants but no longer living in fear of the law - in any case, much of the work is allegedly managed by a senior public officer.

Then something happened. Pauline is not sure what but he left Malta suddenly in January, saying he had to go to Syria to see family and he never returned. She has no way of contacting him.

His girlfriend had by then moved on and Pauline was kicked out of the house. She was once again homeless. But she was a few years older and a few years wiser. One night she woke up in a cold sweat and realised what she should have known all along: there's no place like home. She ground her ecstasy tablets into the ground and picked up the phone.

Months have passed now. Her father has commissioned a lawyer to get her marriage annulled - but she dreads the possible complications. After all, she has no idea where her husband is and knows she has to persuade the judge it was a sham marriage, never consummated, in spite of the fact that she lived in his flat for some years.

But she has stayed off drugs, she has a regular job and is blossoming under the warmth of her father's love.

She now sits in his kitchen, clutching a mug of coffee and, at last, she feels no fear. "My advice to other young girls is: Don't get trapped. I didn't know that I could have just gone back home. I was scared. But my dad gave me one more chance.

"Whatever your problems are, there is always a solution. Now when I hear people say they want to leave home because of problems with their parents, I beg them not to.

"Don't let people drag you into the sort of things I did... Don't think that drugs or alcohol help you escape; they make it worse... And don't think that you are alone and think that the only way out is to try to kill yourself, as I did. There are always people you can turn to.

"I made really stupid mistakes; my life was upside-down. But your parents will understand, even if you did something wrong."

The name Pauline is fictitious, changed to protect the woman's identity.

Criminal offence

Justice and Home Affairs Minister Tonio Borg confirmed last May that the government plans to make marriages of convenience a crime. Legislation approved in 2000 laid down that one had to be married and living with his/her spouse for five years in order to be able to apply for Maltese citizenship. However, upon marriage, the foreign spouse gets exempt status, which virtually amounts to freedom of movement, entitling them to live and work here.

The proposed amendment to the Criminal Code would make a marriage on the basis of false pretences a crime.

It is impossible to estimate the number of marriages of convenience. However, the Catholic Enquiry Centre recently reported that Maltese men and women married partners from 54 nationalities over the past three years, the leading ones Moroccan (55), Syrian (47), British (42), Libyan (34), Russian (34) and Egyptian (24).