I refer to Clifford Galea’s letter Legitimacy Of Organised Dissent (July 9) wherein, when discussing the December 12, 1981 general election result, the correspondent conveniently forgot to say that dissent arose because, under the proportional representation system the political party which obtained the highest number of valid votes cast ended up with a minority of parliamentary seats.

The official 1981 general election result read as follows: Malta Labour Party – 109,990 votes = 34 parliamentary seats; Nationalist Party – 114,132 votes = 31 parliamentary seats.

In view of the above, one can publicly ask Mr Galea whether what the Nationalist Party then contended about this result was correct, in the sense that electoral districts had been manipulated beforehand by a (Socialist) hand-picked electoral commission with the hidden aim of accomplishing a perverse electoral result.