When, in the next few days, Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando remarries, he may think, as he has every right to, that this is a private and personal matter.

But considering that he is a legislator and was one of the parliamentary majority that voted in favour of the introduction of divorce in Malta, sustaining what a non-binding referendum had ruled, there are some ethical issues that should be explored.

Seeing that he was not only one of the legislators who voted in favour of the introduction of divorce but actually one of the leading figures of the campaign, actually the one who with his Private Member’s Bill set the ball in motion, then the ethical questions I intend to explore become rather more serious.

The question, put in simple terms, is this: how far can a legislator go in search not just of the national interest but also, and especially, of his own personal interest?

During the divorce referendum campaign, there were many who declared themselves in favour of the introduction of divorce who themselves, in their own personal life, had no intention to divorce. Such people were motivated by what they saw as the national interest.

However, there was quite a widespread perception out there that those who were in favour of divorce must have some problems in their marriage. When I wrote in favour of the introduction of divorce, we had phone calls from so-called friends who quite anxiously asked us if we were ‘OK?’

The same question was asked to many who had expressed themselves in favour of the introduction of divorce.

Since then, I have marvelled at the fact that many people I know who were in favour of the introduction of divorce (but who were not MPs) and who in their personal situation seemed very eager to get it, have somehow not made the move. I also know of people who, while they have obtained divorce, have so far not remarried.

In this case, JPO is the only public figure I know who has obtained divorce and is getting remarried.

I think that in the current ethical wasteland that (for all talk about IVF) Malta has become, and especially when the events of the past months have shown there is a general lack of clarity in many legislators’ minds about ethical issues, one can perhaps explore to what extent may legislators decide in such a way that furthers their own personal life.

Clearly, the rot starts even higher. This after all has been the legislature in which ministers awarded themselves a €500 a week wage rise in such a sneaky way that they acted with impunity for a long time until they were caught out. It later emerged that the increases had been deftly and artfully hidden among the minutiae that even the experienced hawk-eyed Opposition members could not find them at first.

The ethical issues get muddled up as one understands the issues that legislators deliberate and vote upon. For instance, had the MPs, as against the ministers, decided to award themselves the same €500 a week raise, by means of a parliamentary vote, there are enough checks and balances that would impede their doing so.

But that does not hinder their acting on behalf of special interests. The US Congress and the European Parliament are famous for legislators acting, side by side with representing their constituents, also on behalf of organisations and pressure groups of all kinds.

In my years of journalism I have not come across such blatant distortion of the parliamentary rules of democracy in Malta. At most, MPs act on behalf of constituents, both individuals, groups as well as business enterprises, through the informal channels of lobbying ministers and door-stepping government departments.

If I think hard enough, the only case I can remember when MPs (of both sides) acted in a way that was not clear at all, was when the Structural Plan was discussed in great detail, with input from all sides, and when later on the so-called Rationalisation Exercise added more land to the development areas of Malta and Gozo. No real analysis has, to my mind, been done of that exercise and perhaps none can be carried out since what really happened may have been purposely buried deep in the dust.

There is no need now to rehearse the arguments for the introduction of divorce that were ultimately the reason why a majority of Maltese voted in favour. However, much as I have tried to remember, I do not recall any of the pro-divorce lobby saying clearly: “I have a personal situation that means I will be one of the first to apply for divorce and, if I obtain it, I will remarry.” Not that this would have made things any different, but at least it would have served to clear the air from many misconceptions. It is always better to declare your personal situation and how you may benefit from what you are proposing.

It is equally clear that none of the pro-divorce exponents ventured to ask people to vote Yes to enable the exponent to settle his personal matters. People voted Yes to see the introduction of divorce in Malta and if any of the people did so for their own personal reasons, they could not have been the deciding factor, considering the quite few divorce cases that have been decided so far.

It is equally clear, in my mind at least, that now that divorce is on the statute books, JPO was quite right to apply for it and, once he obtained his divorce, to remarry. Being an MP should not lead to his having less rights than the average Maltese citizen. Nor should his leading of the divorce campaign disqualify him from obtaining what he struggled to obtain for the rest of the country.

Still, this case is one of the very few cases I can remember where legislators stood to personally benefit by their vote and, while there is no question of the legislators somehow being banned from exercising the right they obtained for their fellow citizens, it still leaves some thinking citizens raising questions that the current pre-electoral gadarene rush is stifling.

Much has happened since the introduction of divorce. There has not been any rush to the courts and remarriages have been kept rather quiet as couples who have long desired this right finally could settle matters.

Then, as we all remember, came the final blows on Dr Gonzi’s government’s coffin, the Franco Debono vote, which led to the resignation of Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici and JPO’s sudden vote that led to the defenestration of Richard Cachia Caruana. The Gonzi government is now on life-support and the Dr Gonzi I met at the Seabank inauguration on Thursday is a dead tired man (and living in a suit day in day out in this sweltering heat surely saps one’s strength). Even as he was surrounded by supporters and sycophants and pushed here and there, he is not just tired but tired tired. He has been driving himself so hard, taking all the decisions by himself, not daring to allow his subordinates to solve some things, taking some quite difficult decisions, and trying to keep smiling all the time despite the turmoil deep in his psyche, facing up to the music and being pilloried all the time because it’s always Gonzi this and Gonzi that.

If the heat gets through the electricity cables and power fails, it’s Gonzi’s fault. If the hospital does not have enough beds, it’s Gonzi’s fault. Only if Arriva is mentioned in the news (for a negative reason) it’s Austin Gatt’s fault. But then even this is Gonzi’s fault for keeping him on. And so on.

And yet he struggles on, seeing in the eyes of the people he meets the common perception he will lose the coming election. Rather stupidly, delaying and delaying again the election date reinforces this perception in people’s minds that he is not going to the country in the coming weeks because even he expects to lose. Which may be the completely wrong interpretation of things as he sees them. Thus the perception of an impending electoral defeat gets strengthened and reinforced.

But maybe, just maybe, that widespread perception has been artfully inserted into the national bloodstream. People, acknowledged partisan, who have been going round houses tell me all this supposedly solid Labour advantage is more fragile than appears and even declared Labour supporters have their doubts on the Labour leaders. Les jeux non sont faits (The chips are not down).

JPO is on his way out, getting as an almost private citizen what he fought for citizens to get. Franco Debono, albeit protesting all the way, is also on his way out and his margin of threatening to bring the government down either because of Austin Gatt’s permanence or because of the IVF Bill, are the ‘dead cat bounce’ at the very tail-end of the legislature. One does not really expect the government to survive for many weeks once the House meets after the summer holidays.

Increasingly, the attention focuses on the new candidates, which explains the venom with which some of them are being targeted.

But even at this very tail-end of the legislature, there is still need to insist on a more solid ethical approach to legislation and legislators than has been evident over the past years. Otherwise we would not be in the morass we find ourselves. The real cause for the current political crisis is that in the past not enough attention was given to candidates and their personal morals and ethical standards, and it was all welcome aboard as long as you could get a couple (of hundred) votes. And see where that got us.

To recap, maybe there was no other way of getting over the divorce hurdle, and maybe the country should be grateful to JPO and his merry band for getting that over with the (almost) minimum fuss, even if he himself was one of the first to benefit from the new law.

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The Russian ambassador

Russian ambassador to Malta Boris Marchuk has taken umbrage at what I wrote last Sunday (What’s Pussy Riot in Maltese?), but rather strangely he chose to address his letter of reply to the daily (where it appeared on Thursday) rather than to the readers of this Sunday paper.

He strongly rebuts my charge that the court case of the punk rock band Pussy Riot, three girls in their 20s, is no Kremlin crackdown on freedom of expression.

Oh no, Mr Marchuk, then what do you call their continuing incarceration since February, and the fact they were not allowed to see their babies, or the fact they were taken to court in handcuffs as if they were criminals?

And it is not just the international media that has called attention to this cause célèbre but now even the European Commission.