Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1115758
26 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 12 MAY 2019 OPINION Raphael Vassallo How to (accidentally) legalise abortion in Malta... A lot of fuss has been made about a 'pro-life' billboard erected by the Nationalist Party this week: the one with a picture of a six-to-eight-week- old baby, with the words: "Life: it's my right" (or "I have the right to live", if you prefer.) Personally, I can't understand what all this fuss is about. With the exception of Nor- man Lowell – who has pro- posed 'benign mercy-killing' for babies suffering from any physical or mental abnormali- ties – no one is even remotely questioning the 'right to life' of any baby that has already been born. In fact, I still haven't worked out why so many people seem to think this billboard is even a reference to 'abortion' in the first place. It isn't, quite frankly. By definition, 'abor- tion' can only ever be applied to a pregnancy. And I think we can all safely agree that a pregnancy ends, the moment the baby is delivered. Effectively, then, what that billboard is really telling us is that the Nationalist Party considers 'killing babies' to be wrong. And… erm… what, did they us expect us to be 'relieved' to find that out? Did they really suspect we may have harboured any doubts to the contrary? No, I didn't think so either. (Now: had that billboard proposed 'barbecuing babies on a spit', on the other hand… you get the point.) Ah, but that interpretation is limited only to the message imparted by image and slogan: alone, and stripped of any context. Against the backdrop of an electoral campaign in which 'abortion' has undeni- ably become an issue – and coming from a party that has a whole history of weaponising abortion for political purposes – the underlying meaning is painstakingly clear. Yes, it is an anti-abortion message, of sorts: only it is coming from people who: a) can't tell the difference between a baby and a foetus, and; b) don't seem to know what the word 'abortion' even means. But then again… so what? Why all the fuss, Gus? I fail to see what's so objectionable about a pro-life party pub- licly declaring its position on the issue of abortion: at any time whatsoever, still less a few weeks before an election. I would have thought that's only to be expected. After all, no one would have batted an eyelid had the PN come out against 'tax harmonisation', or 'land reclamation', or 'the Gozo tunnel' (which it already either 'did' or 'didn't', depend- ing which party spokesman you listen to)… so why should abortion be any different? And besides, it's hardly like anyone can claim to be 'surprised', either. This is the same PN that tried to entrench Malta's total abortion ban in the Constitution in 2005… that negotiated an 'abortion protocol' into the EU Acces- sion Treaty… and has been busy scaremongering about abortion before every elec- tion since the mid-1990s… etc. etc. So the only element of 'surprise' here is that they evidently still feel the need to inform us of their pro-life views… despite having spent over 20 years ramming those views down our collective throats. (I mean… how stupid do they even think we are, to still not have worked it out all these years later?) But I still can't really fault them for relaying that message as part of their official cam- paign. I see nothing either il- legitimate or underhand about nailing one's own colours to the mast. The same, however, can- not really be said for another 'slogan' based around the same theme. Twice now, the PN has trumpeted the message that 'a vote for Labour is a vote for abortion'. That goes slightly beyond an affirmation (how- ever unnecessary) of one's own beliefs; that's a case of gratuitously imputing beliefs and positions to others… the same tactic that was employed against Alternattiva Demokra- tika (the PN's 'allies', in the struggle to join the EU) back in the days of Harry Vassallo... and especially against Arnold Cassola before the 2004 Euro- pean elections (more on this later). I shall have to concede, however, that the landscape surrounding this issue has changed considerably in the past 15 years. Back in 2004, abortion was simply not an issue at all. No one was even remotely discussing it at the time; so for the PN to just pull it out of a hat like that – dishonestly, for no other reason than to smear their opponents – was: a) particu- larly odious, and; b) spectac- ularly counter-productive. Ironically, the PN only suc- ceeded in placing abortion onto the agenda for discus- sion, where it had never been before… thus drawing public attention to our country's an- tediluvian total abortion ban, which extends to cases of rape, incest, terminal foetal impair- ment, and risk to the mother's health. So if women's rights' organisations (and, more re- cently, doctors) now openly ar- gue in favour of limited access to abortion… the PN only has itself to blame. They were the ones who pointed their fingers, and told us where to look; they should have predicted that some of us would not particu- larly like what we saw. But that was in 2004. Today – i.e., now that women and doctors 'disliked what they saw' enough to form lobby- groups, and actively campaign for the decriminalisation of abortion in Malta – the same tactic has to be revisited ac- cordingly. Suddenly, it is no longer all that 'illegitimate' or 'unfair' to question another party's position (or creden- tials) on this issue. With abortion now firmly on the national agenda… political parties do need to tell us where they stand: both for the benefit of pro-life voters, and also for those among us – myself in- cluded – who agree with those calls for decriminalisation. The PN is also well within its rights to remind us where the European Party of Socialists stands on abortion. Of course, we could always extend that to all sorts of other areas: such as where the PN's policies contrast with those of their al- lies in the EPP… but it doesn't change the fact that Labour's position does conflict rather glaringly with that of the EPS. The same goes for AD within the European Greens, and – much more drastically – for pro-life PD within the 'Alli- ance of European Liberals and Democrats' (!). At a time when (admittedly very small) pockets of civil society are openly calling for, at minimum, a debate on the subject… it is hardly sufficient for a political party to simply reiterate the (very easy) line that: 'we are in favour of life, full-stop'. Labour has to ex- plain why its position on abor- tion is so very different from that of practically every other Socialist party in Europe (note: I only put in 'practically' to cover my ass there: my hunch Personally, I can't understand what all this fuss is about