The Electoral Commission was granted a three-month extension by the President to verify signatures calling for an abrogative referendum on spring hunting.
Without the extension the commission would not have managed to meet the 15-day deadline imposed by law that expires today.
Chief Electoral Commissioner Joseph Church yesterday told Times of Malta that the process to verify more than 40,000 signatures calling for an end to spring hunting was “laborious” and coincided with the European Parliament election.
He said the commission asked for the extension to be able to meet the legal requirements of verifying whether all signatories appeared in the electoral register, including a visual comparison of the signatures against ID card records.
Mr Church said the extension was possible under the General Elections Act that also applied to the law regulating referendums.
“It does not mean we will take the full three months because we can finish the process before but I do not have an army of people here,” he said. The anti-spring hunting petition calling for an abrogative referendum was presented on March 28 after a coalition of environmental groups, including Alternattiva Demokratika, collected more than 44,000 signatures.
The law says that a petition calling for a referendum to abolish a law or regulations has to be signed by 10 per cent of the electorate to be valid. This equates to more than 33,000 signatures.
AD deputy chairman Carmel Cacopardo said the coalition got to know about the extension this week and asked for a meeting with the commission.
“I cannot really comment until the commission gives us an explanation on how it intends to proceed and I hope this will be forthcoming when we meet next week,” Mr Cacopardo said.
The coalition has also asked the commission to be given access to the vetting process, he added.
But it will still be some time before the proposed referendum can take place.
After the verification process is complete, the onus shifts to the constitutional court where opponents of the referendum have three months to register objections of a procedural nature.
The grounds for objection are limited: objectors can argue that the 10 per cent benchmark of signatories was not reached; or that if parts of a law are repealed it will render the law incompatible with the Constitution and the European Convention Act.
This last point is the more important one because an abrogative referendum cannot be held to cancel certain laws that include the Constitution, the European Convention Act and any fiscal legislation.
However, the legal notice that makes spring hunting possible does not fall within the prohibited parameters. After the time period for objections lapses, the referendum proponents will have a month to reply and the court will have another month to set a hearing if it deems it necessary.
A decision will be given a month later and if the court rules that the referendum can go ahead the President will set a date for the poll – not less than three months and not later than six from the decree. The result will only be valid if voter turnout surpasses the 50 per cent mark.