As a human being, a medical professional and a former politician, my President, Dr George Vella, is above any shadow of corruption, dishonesty or lack of moral integrity but I have every right to review his performance in the fulfilment of his constitutional functions and obligations.

I want to believe that my President will be celebrated not only as a good leader, but as a good man too, embodying not simply political skill, but personal virtue. I believe that the Office of the President has to be occupied by a president who must be virtuous, beginning with the thought that a person in that office will face new and unanticipated problems during his or her term. A president whose decision-making is informed by a consistent character, will, in the face of new challenges, rely upon the lessons that have built that character. A president whose decisions are not grounded in the right sort of ethical values may be less well-equipped to respond well and, more importantly, might be frighteningly unpredictable in his responses.

Rules, to put it simply, do not work unless people governed by those rules care about them and voluntarily choose to abide by them. If this is true of citizens, it is even more true of the president, whose opportunities to damage the system through unprincipled actions are so much greater. It is with this reasoning that President Vella signed a law legalising cannabis for recreational use, in spite of protestations by a number of NGOs and the medical professionals who expressed their concern, the same concern that Vella himself had spoken about earlier when he made public his serious doubts about legalising cannabis for recreational use.

Yet I did not see the same reasoning when, with respect to his hesitation and, ultimately, avoidance to put his signature on the IVF law that Parliament had enacted, the country lived through an unprecedented seven-week constitutional impasse. Constitutionally speaking, this was in no way a storm in a teacup, and neither were the various descriptions of this strategy as a convenient abuse of our constitution simply noise. Delaying, and eventually shirking his constitutional duty to sign the respective law may pave the way for future, unwarranted actions that could easily, even if unintentionally, lead to a greater constitutional impasse.

Ours is a non-executive presidency typically embodying and representing the legitimate constitutional authority of the state, with the performance of ceremonial and official functions in which the identity and authority of the state as such, rather than that of the incumbent government, is emphasised. A presidency in which there is no discretion in the performance of those official duties, and, among others, when a Bill is presented for signature this must be done immediately. The immediacy of the signature strengthens the legitimacy of government acts by adding its moral, ceremonial and institutional authority as the embodiment of the state to the government’s partisan mandate.

So, Mr President, I am quite perplexed and perturbed as to why, just as you had done with regard to the cannabis Bill, you did not publicly express your personal concerns about the IVF legal amendments, raising questions and keeping us guessing as to whether you were going to sign them into law. Before eventually being signed by your temporary substitute you simply and vaguely kept on assuring us that the law will be signed.

What followed after this constitutional breach was a barrage of calls forthcoming from various quarters for you to resign. You kept on resisting those calls, feeling that you should not resign for failing to personally sign IVF amendments into law. You persisted in your reluctance to open up about the reasons for your strange and illogical behaviour. Sure, as you have assured us, one day when the time is right, you will tell the entire story and you will be able to speak more freely. Till then, however, this will not appease growing concerns and conjectures as to what might have gone on behind the scenes. More importantly, if you were hampered by a conflict of conscience because of your pro-life views, this would have to be somehow reconciled with what you have publicly put on record with respect to that other potential abortion Bill ever finding itself on your lap for signature.

You have made it amply clear that you would never sign a Bill concerning abortion. You pledged that you would never sign a Bill that involves the authorisation of murder. Of course, you cannot stop the executive from deciding, that is up to Parliament.  But you do have the liberty, if you do not agree with a Bill, to resign and go home. You should have no problem doing this. Yet, apparently, you did have a problem doing this, both with the cannabis and the IVF Bills.

Any justification of double standards or distinction in weights and measures does not hold water on the basis of the severity and extent of one’s conflict of conscience. With this background, one really hopes that if and when any abortion Bill does pass through our House of Representatives you will keep your public promise that you pledged us as head of state.

Once you are free to resign your constitutional office, I do not wish to have a president undergoing a severe crisis of conscience every time a Bill comes up for your signature that is in stark conflict with your publicly-expressed conscience. Otherwise, it is best not to express any feelings at all.

 

Dr Mark Said is an advocate