JPO is happily heading a coalition of sorts that will campaign for the introduction of divorce. While it is definitely encouraging that persons from both sides of the parliamentary divide can join with social powers that have been stonewalled out of the institution thanks to the PLPN rules it would seem that the very participants are blissfully unaware of how this IVA business can turn into a great deception.
It is one thing to form a movement that lobbies for the introduction of divorce and another to choose a slogan that is an evident throwback to the referendum moments pre-EU accession. I am sure that I will be called the eternal cynic in this respect and that the excuse that “some effort is better than no effort at all ” will be thrown back at me in full force but the advocates of this new IVA movement should be made aware of the constitutional (and marketing) pitfalls of their arrangement.
By orienting their movement to a referendum style formation the IVA for divorce group has already conceded valuable ground in the battle for the introduction of the divorce. They are virtually admitting that this will have to be a majority decision in the form of a referendum and/or consultation of the people. They are allowing the parties in parliament to do what they do best – i.e. abdicate from any responsibility of legislating for divorce as they should have done decades ago.
Instead JPO & friends give the impression of being much more interest in the limelight afforded by this discussion than by the actual force of their argument. Divorce is not a majority question. The Bonnett Balzans of this world may come back at divorce arguments with the fire and brimstone philosophy but the endline in a normal democracy operating in normal conditions would be for the parliament to legislate and allow for a legal possibility that has long been missing in our juridical system.
Instead we have IVA. And IVA to what? As we have pointed out previously under Maltese law we do not have a propositive referendum. Should we have a referendum on the matter that would probably come AFTER parliament introduces a law on divorce – because our law allows for abrogative referenda: a referendum asking the people whether they want to abrogate (cancel, annull, remove) a law that has been enacted. In which case the answer for the IVA movement should be LE (no, I do not want the divorce law removed) and not IVA. Quite a quandary no?
But of course the PLPN will play along with the whole idea of a consultative referendum. It pays them because they can blame “the people” for whatever decision is taken in the case of divorce. We might have JPO & friends to thank for any eventual cock up…
