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MaltaToday’s claim that we decided to boycott the newspaper is evidence, if any was needed, of your intent to misrepresent us.
You have failed to inform your readers that in the week preceding your article, we corresponded with you repeatedly by email on this matter.
In this exchange you asked us to confirm whether we had decided to boycott your newspaper. On our part, we never spoke of a boycott, let alone confirmed it. We simply insisted that you should first grant us our right of reply and publish our reply to your allegations, with the same prominence, in accordance with the law.
When we pressed you on our right of reply, you went as far as suggesting - very unethically - that you could always pretend that you never received our reply claiming an ‘error in transmission’.
All this is documented in our email exchange.
Rather than confirming that you will give us our right of reply, you concluded that we have decided to boycott your newspaper. As we told you in reply, jumping to conclusions seems to have become your style.
We also want to take this opportunity to react to your article entitled ‘Busuttil and Casa vote against, Grech in favour of European People’s party amendment’.
This article referred to our voting pattern on the issue of abortion during a resolution in the European Parliament on the Millenium Development Goals (MDG).
Our concern during this vote was not whether we would vote with the far right. Or the far left that matter. Our concern was simply to vote against any reference, whether generic or otherwise, to abortion.
We did so because it is in line with our principles, with the position in our national law as well as with our electoral commitment as PN MEPs.
To be sure, our political group, the EPP-ED, also voted, in the main, against abortion – in stark contrast to the Greens and the Socialists. But we still felt that our group’s position did not go far enough. That is why we voted differently to our group on some votes. And we have no regrets.
However, we do regret to see that the European Parliament has a clear majority that favors abortion, although one has to acknowledge that this is also a reflection of the fact that the vast majority of EU countries have long legalized abortion. Thankfully, this majority will not translate itself into an EU law on abortion since the EU has no competence to act in this area.
Sadly, your article misses the point that we were the only two Maltese MEPs to have consistently and unequivocally voted against all references to abortion, whether direct or indirect.
Simon Busuttil MEP
David Casa MEP
Editorial note: The reference to an email exchange is incorrrect and miscontrued. All this is documented in our email exchange.
MaltaToday has an obligation to look into the actions of Maltese MEP’s. And Dr Busuttil and Mr Casa should be more open to scrutiny from an irreverent press.
MaltaToday welcomes Dr Busuttil’s and Mr Casa’s decision to renege on their boycott of MaltaToday.
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