So now we are going to ‘vote’ on whether to be allowed to vote
The Justice Minister: Manboobs Bonnici
Justice Minister Owen Bonnici has taken a break from crashing his car in between answering Franco Debono’s persistent telephone calls and messages and has announced this morning that there will be “public consultation” on whether to cancel the next lot of local council elections.
Consulting the public on whether the public should be allowed to vote in an election?
Whatever next.
Life under Taghna Lkoll becomes more Orwellian by the day, but that could be foreseen by anybody with his head screwed on right because the election campaign itself was textbook Orwellianism.
The worst bit of it all is that the government is talking about CANCELLING the next round of local council elections, which is in fact what will happen if its plans come to fruition, but about POSTPONING them.
Given that this supposed ‘postponement’ will be to 2019 (five years hence), when another round of local council elections will have to held anyway, what this means is that the next round of elections will be cancelled and we will move straight to the next round after that. This is not postponement but cancellation.
Also, it is patently obvious what is happening here: the general election is in 2018. If the local council elections due to be held before that are cancelled, the government will not face another popularity test between the EP elections last May and the general election itself.
The last round of local council elections was held in 2012.
The prime minister says he is doing this because of “election fatigue”. Yes, ri-g-h-t.
The Opposition leader says that this is “no ordinary controversy but strikes right to the heart of democracy”. It is the thinking of a dictatorship, he said, in which elections are held if and when the dictatorship deems them to be convenient to its purposes.
The government would not have even thought about this had the Labour Party not had a majority across local councils, which it does.
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Seems confidential polls show clearly which way the hunting referendum will go if held in conjunction.
Muscat exists purely as a winner, he just cannot afford to lose; nothing to justify defeat, pure fabrication.
Call it the foxxGonzi syndrome.
Oh look there’s Cacopardo in that picture.
Yes. I was asking myself “what the heck is Carmel Cacopardo, with his seemingly stupid half-smile/smirk, doing behind Owen Bonnici? Does he too deem himself to be on the right side of history?”
Trying to please the crowds. Just like Owen Bonnici there.
I’m starting to think I might be on the wrong side of history.
Where can one express one’s view on this as part of the public consultation? This rather important piece of information was not mentioned in the report
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20140829/local/postponment-of-council-elections-is-attempt-to-discourage-voters-from-voting-in-hunting-referendum-birdlife.533627
Next election they will re-elect themselves and that will save a lot of money to the people of China.
Thank you, Daphne, for pointing out that this is a cancellation of the local elections not a postponement. The claim that the previous administration also postponed elections is therefore irrelevant.
Whatever one thinks of Local Councils, removing elections is always alarming and antidemocratic. This is even more so when patently false reasons are given, such as the excuse that it is a money-saving measure.
Next year a referendum will have to be held, unless the government intends removing that as well. This will involve all the major expenses associated with elections: printing and distributing voting documents, preparing polling booths and boxes, giving extra duties to the police, recruiting assistant electoral commissioners for the polling stations and counting hall, and so on.
If local elections are held on the same day, the only extra cost will be the printing of ballot papers and, perhaps, a few more hours counting votes. The rest are all ‘overheads’ which will be incurred whether or not the elections are held. Since only a part of Malta will be voting for their Council, the printing of ballot papers should cost considerably less than when they had to be reprinted because of Cyrus Engerer.
I know that voting whether to vote is bizarre, like something that script writers of a satirical play might come up with. But stranger things happen in Muscat’s Malta. I think the PN should consider collecting signatures to ask for a referendum to abrogate the changes made to the Local Councils law. The government cannot go unchallenged when it is eroding democracy in such a blatant, arrogant manner.
I just love the woman holding the poster “I am on the right side of history”…. Yeah right.
Only because she is standing at Minister Owen Bonnici’s right.
If Joe Muscat succeeds in stopping the council elections and the people including the Opposition accept, nothing will hold him back from cancelling the next general elections.
I had predicted that he will be worse than Mintoff, albeit he knows how to play the game more than Dom did.
Somewhere between now and 2018, Franco Debono will present the government with draft constitution for Muscat’s Second Republic, headed by an Executive President wielding extensive powers, and unfettered by any Senate or local councils.
The cancellation of the local council elections is part of the exercise to clear the decks for President Joseph Muscat and Ffirst Lady Michelle – the attainment of Joseph Muscat’s interpretation of the American Dream, the beginning of the end of democracy in Malta, and the formalisation of Malta as a Banana Republic.
The seven year term an obvious choice no doubt.
In so many months that Labour has been in government we have learned that Joe is running the act. But then who is running the country ?
Small but significant – The worst bit of it all is that the government isN’T talking about CANCELLING the next round of local council elections, which is in fact what will happen if its plans come to fruition, but about POSTPONING them.
It’s obvious.The problem is not the local councils (which the PL wins time and again, anyway) but the very possible, positive result of ban-spring-hunting referendum.
“Look, those balloons are as big as my boobs.”
There is no excuse for cancelling elections. Despite this, saving money was the reason. So I wonder how much it will cost to have a referendum on whether to cancel an election?
Had to shake the man’s hand at Joseph Calleja concert. Apart from the ridiculous greeting of ‘okej, hi, kif inti?’ he gave me the limpest, wet handed, finger shake ever. How embarrassing for him.
Ahseb u ara kemm ser jaghmlu referendum vote fuq il-kacca. Koz, election fatigue is also a nice excuse not to irk the hunters and their families (vote)
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-29002162?ocid=socialflow_facebook