Reading through Raphael Vassallo’s article “Rebecca in the lions’ den” (10 October, 2007), one sees only one side of the abortion issue and no more. He comments against the silent march in Valletta against the message of death brought to Malta by Dr Gomperts, and against my proposals in the Sunday Times on 7 October on alternatives to abortion overseas.
Abortion has been called “the murder of unborn children” repeatedly by so many people all over the world, including many ex-abortionists, ever since it became convenient for pregnant women to resort to abortion to resolve their problems, especially in the western liberal world in the last three decades.
Dr Tony Levatino, the American gynaecologist and ex-abortionist who was in Malta last year, declared in an article in Pink Magazine of the Times of December 2006: “I performed thousands of abortions.” Then at a certain point in his life he said: “It hits you it’s a real person you are killing”.
Lately, to my knowledge, Mr Vassallo wrote two articles on abortion in MaltaToday and he never, ever, referred to the plight of unborn children, let alone expand on their right to life in the womb, their need for love and protection and their right for wholesome development.
It seems Mr Vassallo is obsessed with championing only the rights of women to choose to abort... obviously their unwanted unborn children. As if he is writing about a woman’s right to choose to remove a wart, or a cancerous growth, from any part of her body. At no time does he write about the mother’s privilege to give life and birth to her unborn child and the dignity of human life at its very beginning in the mother’s womb. Yet he castigated me for defending life from its very beginning.
This has been the central point of my articles in the press and the long conversations on the phone I had with Mr Vassallo. I told him many times that the essence of my article in the Sunday Times, which he criticised so harshly, was not the application of the four laws on the unborn child which we have in Malta and which I mentioned in the same article. It was about “the creation... by the government… of the necessary compassionate, advisory and therapeutic services for pregnant women, and their partners, who would be considering resorting to abortion”.
I also told him the Gift of Life Foundation (GLF), one of the 44 organisations in the Malta Unborn Child Movement (MUCM), had found the means to start its project HOPE which offers personal medical, advisory and therapeutic services to pregnant women not to resort to abortions, or had procured one already. I included this in my SToM article. I told him the GLF project reports no one to the police but helps pregnant women in their plight. Why, again, did he leave out all this in his article? He misled his readers and, again, in a very cynical way, as last time, ridiculed the organisers of the silent march and the writer of the Sunday Times article. It seems it’s his brand of journalsm which, I feel, does no good service to the profession.
He also wrote “... only to promptly dismiss all questions regarding which laws are actually being broken in this scenario”. In my SToM article and in our telephone conversation I mentioned not one, but four laws and I mention them again here: the law prohibiting abortion of more than 100 years, the Children and Young Persons Act of 1980, the Commissioner for Children Act of 2003 and, in particular, the Domestic Violence Act of 2005 which includes the unborn child as a “member of the household” to be protected from “any” type of domestic violence. Surely abortion, read death, is the worse kind of domestic violence. Yet he kept fiddling to find the proverbial legal needle in the haystack. Then he printed what he fancied in his weekly column in the press.
He also labelled some of my arguments radical without including information I gave him that at present there are more than 200 care orders whereby social workers from Agenzija Appogg have deprived parents of the legal custody of their children, even summarily, according to the provisions of the Children and Young Persons Act of 1980, because of grave neglect or outright abuse, physical or sexual, by the same parents. In turn they put them into children’s home, or foster them, until the situation improves.
I also explained to him that as a social worker and a former director of the Department of Family Welfare I practised adoption and fostering of Maltese children for many years and that in Malta and Gozo, also at present, there are many Maltese married couples ready to adopt and/or foster any unwanted unborn children, once born. This as an alternative to abortion whether in Malta or overseas, and to give unborn children the right to life, good care and upbringing once born. But Mr Vassallo again left out all this in his article and opted to write about red rags, bulls and lions.
Mr Vassallo should know that a personal freedom, whether it is one of the “four freedoms of the EU” or not, extends only up to where one’s freedom transgresses on the freedom of others, equally entitled to their freedoms. This until both lose their rights altogether if, in turn, they abuse their freedom at the expense of others, including unborn children. Otherwise, why are there so many people in prisons in the democratic world?
He seems to be a devoted disciple of Dr Gomperts for, like her, he is so oblivious to the plight of the unborn child that he has, perhaps unknowingly, but effectively, let the mother’s womb look like “a lion’s den” for the unborn child. He implies, by default, that the unborn child does not exist, even more does not form part of the debate. As if he descended on this earth like a shooting star and not after spending nine months in his mother’s womb. Even the good Lord passed this way.
Mr Vassallo is definitely pro-choice and not pro-life and this explains it all. To me he writes fantasy, prejudiced, and cynical articles and seems to have the habit, and the arrogance, to include things in them, and leave out others, and then interprets them as he fancies from his privileged position as a syndicated journalist. What about ethics?
May I add, against what Mr Vassallo alleged, that my article to the Sunday Times was sent to the editor two weeks before it was published and it was pure coincidence – at least for me – that it was published on the same day it was announced that Dr Gomports was coming to Malta. This can be attested to by the editor of the Sunday Times. Again Mr Vassallo’s fantasy wins over him.
He made all these mistakes in spite of, at his request, having at his disposal before writing his article, the four articles on this subject I published, two in MaltaToday, two in the Sunday Times and the long Charter on the Rights, Protection and Development of the Unborn Child of MUCM which I sent him a couple of weeks before. Also, my long conversations with him on the phone. Besides the voluminous literature on this subject on the internet, on the websites of the Social Assistance Secretariat, the founder of MUCM, and the Gift of Life Foundation. I also sent Mr Vassallo an SMS to read the very penetrating editorial of The Times of 10 October, “Every life must be protected” to know more on the subject.

Tony Mifsud
Coordinator Malta Movement for the Rights,
Protection and Development of the Unborn Child

Raphael Vassallo writes: I will not take lessons in ethics from Tony Mifsud, whose only argument appears to be that of simply smearing all those who disagree with his extremist opinions with the “pro-choice” label.
Anyone interested in the truth regarding my views on the subject (as opposed to Mr Mifsud’s childish misrepresentations) may wish to read this article: http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/2007/09/09/rvassallo.html
As for the four laws alluded to above: I didn’t mention them for the very obvious reasons that not a single one can be applied to the case of a Maltese woman carrying out an abortion in a country where the procedure is legal. Mr Mifsud: I am still waiting for an explanation as to how this qualifies as “illegal emigration” (your words, not mine).

 

I would like to bring to the attention of drivers entering Valletta and – having no choice – being swallowed up by the CVA web of cameras, that the Malta Transport Authority (ADT) is adamant in collecting payment of parking dues in no uncertain terms. In fact, for a parking bill of Lm1.05, I was charged an additional penalty of Lm2.50 for paying the bill online 10 days after the Bill Due Date.
I have to mention that the bill mentions that “charges apply for late payments” although there is no indication that charges may reach the astronomical figure of 200 per cent of the unpaid bill.
When I contacted the ADT about this and mentioned that I received the bill four days before the due date I was told that there was no record of the bill being returned by the postal authorities and that – according to their records – the bills were posted well before the due date. When I mentioned the excessive penalty I was referred to a legal notice. Of course, in all the pomp and ceremony of launching the CVA, no one took the trouble to mention the tiny detail of the additional penalties. In fact, I doubt if this is mentioned in any of the CVA publicity shots.
So drivers beware – no delays and no excuses. ADT will have nothing of the sort. And by the way, there are alternatives to parking in Valletta for a small fee if one does not mind walking a short distance.

Manuel Zammit
San Gwann

 

The analysis of the recent speeches by the leaders of the two main political parties (10 October, 2007) prompts me to make a comment on each speaker.
The mention of the name of Gonzi by Sant was significant not by its frequency but by the ridiculous way in which it was delivered. It is this which has ridiculed the speaker in front of the public, which is entitled to arrive at its own conclusion of what led to such a miserable performance.
One word which Gonzi used more than once, but whose significance has escaped the attention of your analyst, is “prudence”. This word seems to be also absent from the vocabulary of some members of Gonzi’s team.

Evarist V. Saliba  
Ta’ l-Ibrag

Your editorial of 10 October rightly took umbrage at Dr Austin Gatt’s remarks about the leader of the Opposition and I am quite certain the majority feels the same. However, Dr Sant’s behaviour on 21 September was quickly described as a “joke gone wrong” simply because he said so. Here again, the majority differs strongly because such a display of sick humour must have either been planned or else, the man was not feeling his usual self.
Dr Gatt wrongly attributed Dr Sant’s behaviour to alcohol or drugs, but let’s face it, would one not suspect that something was out of the ordinary, at best? Was that the behaviour of a serious leader of the Opposition, let alone an aspiring soon to be Prime Minister?
Getting into the PN’s “immersion into the cesspit of personal abuse”, I must say that this comment is quite unfair and inaccurate. Not that snide remarks at a time when a general election is in the offing are anything unusual, but to accuse the PN for joining the fray is quite frankly stupid. I follow the news daily, read most papers which are available online including l-Orizzont and often, after reading an MLP rag I have to pop a Dramamine to stop me from tossing my cookies. The truth is that MLP papers and electronic media embark on never-ending mudslinging campaigns, five years long between elections they lose. And one expects the PN to idly take it and not react to the truth twisting methods of the opposition?
If this shocking behaviour is to stop, may I suggest that the MLP should be the first to refrain from condemning each and every PN government project, stop nit-picking at every “delay” in completing a major project without first evaluating the reasons, re-think every project on hand and declare it wasteful (Mater Dei), overdue (Manwel Dimech bridge) and others and only then would the PN find it unnecessary to defend the government. They should examine their conscience regarding their 22-month performance before they cast stones (and mud).
Let me remind you that the “delayed projects” Dr Sant complains about are mostly projects financed by the EU which, if it were up to him would not even be started since he was so vehemently opposed to the Union. If anyone driving a car on a highway made as many U-turns as Dr Sant has, he would certainly be arrested for dangerous driving.
The PN does not find it necessary to attack anybody but on the other hand, why is it so appalling to the press when it defends itself?
You chose to comment about Tony Abela’s question to Charlon Gouder. All well and good. Tony Abela could have bitten his tongue and refrained from posing the question. Yet, you never commented about Charlon’s loaded questions to the Prime Minister and his outright non-acceptance of the PM’s replies to him. Charlon the ‘interviewer’ is one thing but Charlon the MLP ‘pawn’ is another. Truth is that Charlon is a bit too smart for his own good. That is my perception and I think many others share my views.
I am absolutely sure that Dr Gonzi frequently discourages such remarks by his ministers and deputies but in the heat of a particular moment, human beings do and say silly things which they undoubtedly regret later.
I cannot understand, for example, why Dr Sant found it necessary to take his deputy leaders of the MLP and an entourage of other officials, and the television crews to record his triumphant entrance into the Law Courts in order to file a suit against Dr Gatt! Usually such action is merely presented by the lawyers and is totally unnecessary for the plaintiff to even make an appearance.
It’s about time this crap is cut out.

Joe Martinelli
London, ON
Canada