ADPD to challenge 'discriminatory' gender corrective mechanism in constitutional court

The ADPD will initiate legal action before the constitutional court to challenge the gender-corrective mechanism for elections that was adopted recently by parliament.

The mechanism which intends to restore gender parity in parliament will only kick in if two parties are elected.

The ADPD executive on Tuesday decided to challenge the law in the constitutional court.

“It is unacceptable that the law is not equal for everyone: this is supposed to be a basic democratic principle underpinning all legislation,” the party said.

The historic gender parity law was supported by the major parties in the House last week.

ADPD Chairperson Carmel Cacopardo said the mechanism is discriminatory because it distinguishes between women from different parties.

He said that while agreeing in principle on the need to introduce a corrective electoral mechanism to restore gender balance in parliament, the party also insisted the law should be applicable to everyone and should not discriminate between women and parties.

“The Technical Committee for Strengthening Democracy, appointed by the government to draw up the proposals, which committee also coordinated the public consultation, did not even bother to talk to us about the proposals we made, given that we were the only ones to voice an opinion different to what was being proposed,” Cacopardo said.

He went on to say that the country’s electoral system is already designed to favour the big parties, and such an amendment continues to strengthen their grip over Malta’s political system.

“This tailor-made fiddling with the electoral law is compounding the discrimination we suffer, together with that already suffered because of the discriminatory proportionality provisions devised by PLPN. This is the last straw, and we have therefore resolved that the party initiates legal proceedings to address the discrimination,” Cacopardo said.