MEP candidate files Constitutional appeal

MEP candidate Norman Lowell this morning filed a Constitutional appeal from a judgment which had dismissed his Constitutional application claiming that his right to a fair hearing had been breached.

Mr Lowell had been given a two year jail term suspended for four for inciting racial hatred and insulting the President of Malta in speeches in Rabat and Qawra in 2006. He had also been fined €500.

An appeal from the sentence was dismissed last October after it was found that his fundamental human rights had not been violated by a judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeal. A Constitutional application where Mr Lowell argued that he was denied the right to a fair hearing by the appeals court was also dismissed. He is now appealing this latest judgment.

“I still believe in the supreme law of the land. The constitution protects me. It guarantees freedom of expression, even one that shocks and disturbs,” he told a news conference after the case was filed.

Mr Lowell said that he could not accept a highly subjective appeal verdict that threw out the whole concept of freedom on a subjective whim.

Was it possible that the Maltese court throw away freedom of expression on a shameful interpretation, he asked.

Mr Lowell said he could not see himself a criminal deserving a vindictive harsh sentence of two years in prison for defending his country.

History will judge who are the real criminals, he said.

“I am fighting for my country and my people desiring nothing else than to hand over to my children and grandchildren my country as it was handed down to me by my ancestors.

“If this is criminal, then I am proud to be a criminal,” he said.

Mr Lowell also criticised The Times for saying that he was not qualified to contest the MEP elections after he submitted his nomination.

He said that the newspaper had to eat its words the following day but the correction was hidden away on page 13.