Wednesday, 9th July 2008 - 11:27CET
AD seeks participation in talks on democracy
Alternattiva Demokratika has insisted that all political parties should be involved in talks on strengthening democracy.
The party was reacting to an exchange of letters between the Prime Minister and Labour leader Joseph Muscat on areas of discussion.
"AD is fully committed and willing to participate in any political discussions between the political parties with regards to the strengthening of democracy and pluralism in the country," AD chairman Arnold Cassola said.
He said that a government which only has a relative majority is duty bound to involve all political parties in such discussions, particularly discussions related to the financing of political parties, changes to the electoral law, proposals related to the Broadcasting Authority and PBS as well as changes proposed to the Permanent Commission against Corruption.
Dr Cassola reiterated AD's proposal that the government should work towards consensus in the election of a new
President, "an act which would send a strong message of political maturity and unity."
Stephen Cachia, AD's spokesman for democracy and civil rights, said that AD had always participated throughout the years in various institutional discussions on democratic changes for our country.
"Despite the fact that, in the past, the main political parties have regularly chosen partisan short sightedness
over the national interest , we feel that Government now has an opportunity to work towards real change which would truly strengthen our democracy for the benefit of the whole country. AD is totally committed to giving its full share in working together with the other political parties towards such chamge," concluded Mr Cachia.
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Comments
Thus the MLPN set the electoral rules - increasing the national threshold to 16% (i.e. over 45,000 votes), and gerrymandering the electoral districts to split AD stronghold of Swieqi-Sliema (PN objective), whilst giving MLP preference on the overall allocation (MLP’s carrot).
Subsequently the PN carried the campaign of ‘wasted vote’ – which they themselves had induced.
This tampered electoral system is nowhere near anything democratic or representative.
Considering that a handful of hundred voters ‘empowered’ GonziPN to form a govt., a handful of thousands of third parties votes ought to be given due representation.
Who are they trying to fool apart from the parrots who repeat the same messge over and over again.
And do we expect the MLP to help us understand democracy, when they do not even know how to read a referendum result. The kid used to tell us that partnership won, and now he has the audicity to explain democracy to us!! I am lost for words.
One cannot deny that part of AD's failure in electing an MP is because people understand that the electoral system as it stands today favours the two big parties while putting smaller ones at a disadvantage from the very start. It is time for all votes to be given their due and equal importance.