The pro-divorce lobby group that held its first activity yesterday will be organising fundraising activities and seeking funding for their publicity campaign in favour of divorce.

Their campaign will mostly make use of the Internet and social media such as Facebook, but the committee will also try to access other media if the funds are available, said committee member David Micallef St John and Nationalist MP Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando when replying to questions by The Malta Independent.

They spoke during the committee’s first public activity held at the parliamentary library at the Presidential Palace in Valletta yesterday.

The committee will be campaigning for the introduction of divorce legislation, as was proposed by Dr Pullicino Orlando last July.

The committee’s chairperson, lawyer Deborah Schembri, said committee members believe that the legislative process that will hopefully lead to the introduction of divorce in Malta will be free from partisan issues to enable the Maltese people to make an informed choice about divorce.

“We believe in united families and strong marriages but we have to recognise the fact that not all families are united and not all marriages are strong,” she said.

“Marital problems already exist and that is why many seek separation, so technically it’s not divorce that will be separating Maltese married couples. It will not be the cause of marriage breakdown; people will not be forced to seek a divorce and those who get divorced wouldn’t necessarily get married again,” she continued.

“We also believe that those people whose marriage has irretrievably broken down, in spite of all efforts, should be given the possibility to start a new life with another partner within a legal framework recognised by the state. This should be done through the right to divorce and remarry, if they so wish,” she continued.

The committee believes that there should be divorce legislation that protects all parties involved, especially children. Given that the Maltese state recognises divorces given to Maltese citizens by foreign courts, the committee states that it is unjust that other Maltese citizens who are not in a position to obtain a divorce are denied this civil right.

“Divorce is a basic civil right and the lack of it creates a lot of social anomalies and is blatant discrimination against the Maltese people. The lack of divorce does not make sense in a pluralist and democratic state,” said Alternattiva Demokratika chairperson Michael Briguglio while auguring for reciprocal respect among the three political parties on the committee.

Labour MP Evarist Bartolo said there is no guarantee that Parliament or a referendum would approve the divorce legislation, but the committee’s campaign will help people understand that divorce is a civil right and that if a person doesn’t need it, it doesn’t mean that others do not.

Former Nationalist MP Michael Falzon pointed out the difference between divorce and marital breakdown and said that in Malta a distinction is made between the two. The right to happiness should not end when a marriage breaks down, he argued.

The committee has chosen ‘Iva’ (yes) as its name and was set up on the initiative of Dr Pullicino Orlando and Evarist Bartolo, according to Mr Micallef St John. Dr Pullicino Orlando came up with the idea of a pro-divorce movement on 20 October, transmitting it by means of a simple comment on his Facebook page: “Thinking of organising a pro-divorce movement, what do you think?”

He had likened the idea of a pro-divorce movement to the Moviment Iva that campaigned in favour of Malta’s EU membership in the run-up to a referendum in 2003.

In addition to the two MPs, Dr Briguglio, and former minister Michael Falzon, the committee is made up of former Labour MEP candidate Marlene Mizzi (chairman of the Labour Business Forum), AD’s spokesperson for civil rights, Yvonne Arqueros Ebejer, and Martin Scicluna from the Today Public Policy Institute, as well as three individuals who do not represent any party or entity: David Micallef St John, Roderick Bartolo and Etienne Borg. The committee chairman is lawyer Deborah Schembri.