In my opinion, the referendum on divorce due to be held in May is a sheer waste of public money. Therefore, the original position of the Labour Party regarding this matter, i.e. ruling out the need of a referendum, was the right one and made good sense.

In my opinion, the referendum on divorce due to be held in May is a sheer waste of public money. Therefore, the original position of the Labour Party regarding this matter, i.e. ruling out the need of a referendum, was the right one and made good sense.

Let me make one point clear. The Catholic Church has every right to teach and give directives to her members regarding divorce, and the faithful are morally bound to comply. However, what right has the Church to interfere with the rights of non-Catholics regarding marriage and divorce?

Let us take civil marriage as a similar example. For the Catholic Church marriage is a Sacrament and anyone who is a Catholic should marry according to the holy rite of the Church. On the other hand, has the Church any right to intervene how non-members should marry?

Therefore, marriage and divorce are two separate civil rights to be enjoyed by non-Catholics. If the majority of voters in this referendum vote against the introduction of divorce, it would mean that the Catholic majority have opted to deny this civil right of divorce to the minority. Is this the democratic way of how things should be done?

Now, who has the duty to see that the rights of the minorities are safeguarded? It is the government, because it is only the government who collects taxes from the whole population. If the government fails to do its duty towards minorities this would mean that it is not a democratic government, but one with factional interests, who caters only for majorities, and against the interests of smaller groups. This is surely not the right way of how things should be done by a democratically elected government.

For me it was strange news when I heard that the Prime Minister Dr Lawrence Gonzi had said that he would ignore the result of the referendum, if the majority vote was in favour of divorce, and that he would vote against the Divorce Bill in Parliament.

I fully understand that as a Catholic, personally, Dr Lawrence Gonzi has every right, or rather is duty bound to act according to the directives of the Catholic Church, but in his capacity as Prime Minister he is also duty bound to safeguard the rights of the non-Catholic minorities both in respect of civil marriage and divorce.

The Catholic Church should keep on delivering her teachings regarding civil marriage and divorce and all Catholics are duty bound to listen to her. But the Prime Minister and his government, in their official capacity, are also duty bound to safeguard the rights of the minority, even if these rights go against the teachings of the Church, because the government is there for all the sections of society and no group or section, however big, should be privileged over the other.

So, while the Church should continue with her teachings against divorce, the onus of legislating in its favour rests on the government, if it really is a democratic government.

Since the present government had no electoral mandate to introduce divorce, the two parties in Parliament should have reached an agreement to seek simultaneously a mandate in the next general election.

That is why, at the beginning of this letter, I said that the coming referendum is a sheer waste of public money because in a democratic country no one should expect the Catholic majority to agree with the divorce proposal, or otherwise not to impose its will on other minorities.

The present government should have taken as an example the introduction of civil marriage in Malta, which, as everybody knows, was introduced without wasting money on silly referenda.

Anton F. Attard

VICTORIA