John Saliba, (TMID, 2 November), said that it’s “absolutely not true” that a Labour government gave Maltese women the right to vote. Since he writes from far-away South Africa, he may be forgiven if his memories of Maltese political history are a little hazy – or perhaps incomplete.

Mr Saliba wrote that women’s right to vote was granted by the 1947 Constitution – which is true enough, as far as it goes.

What Mr Saliba failed to say, however, is that the draft of this Constitution was drawn up by a Maltese National Assembly. And that this Assembly was largely dominated by a “Labour Front” made up of delegates from the Labour Party, the GWU and other progressive elements.

The motion that there should only be “one vote for each male and female from 18 years of age upwards” was moved by Labour Leader Dr Paul Boffa on 18 July 1945.

The PN delegates made various attempts to block this motion, one of them being an attempt to have women’s right to vote subjected to a national referendum, on the grounds that it was “not advisable to impose upon the large female population an onus and responsibility which the majority would not, perhaps, be prepared to assume ...”. Naturally, only men would have been able to vote in such a referendum.

The rest of Mr Saliba’s assertions are just as

credible.

Victor Laiviera

Naxxar