Cashman chastises Casa’s ‘narrow’ views

Veteran British Labour MEP Michael Cashman – whose two-year report on global poverty was reduced to a pamphlet ‘in favour of abortion’ by Nationalist MEP David Casa – has dismissed such criticism as ‘narrow’ and a case of ‘political mischief’.

Approved by a majority which included many EPP members, the Cashman report is a collection of over 67 specific proposals to facilitate the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals – to which Malta, like all EU member States, in committed to reaching.

These include the financing and implementation of educational programmes in the world’s poorest countries, plans to improve co-ordination of international aid efforts, initiatives to mitigate the effects of climate change, and many other social and political considerations.

But at a press conference last Friday, David Casa seized on one single paragraph (42), which alluded to the need to ensure access to safe abortions, and accused the at his Labour counterparts of ‘voting in favour of abortion’.

In a front-page article the following day, PN-owned newspaper In-Nazzjon dismissed the same report as one that dealt only with ‘the killing of children before they are born’.

“I have not had this reaction in any other country, in or outside the EU,” Cashman said in reaction to both Casa’s comments and the Nazzjon story. “I suspect it is political mischief-making by the PN politicians. It certainly misrepresents the intentions of those who voted in favour of the report, and also misuses the whole issue of abortion. But I don’t want to give these people the importance they don’t deserve. I’d rather praise the courage and far-sightedness of Labour MEPs Scicluna and Grech for supporting the motion instead.”

Cashman acknowledges that the issue of female reproductive rights is contentious, but argues that serious and mature politicians should rise above the temptation to score cheap political points when faced with such a serious discussion.

“There are always difficulties that arise when matters of conscience or religion are brought up in the context of a political debate,” the Socialist MEP said. “But if you can wrestle with these issues and do the right thing for the great majority of people, that is what being politics is all about. The easiest thing to do in politics is simply pander to national prejudice.”

He also insists that the issue of global poverty is inextricably linked to women’s rights.

“You can’t look at achieving the Millennium Development Goals without also taking into account at the huge number of women who die each year as a result of unsafe abortions. All that we ask for is the prevention of unsafe abortions, as well as giving women rights so that the can do what they themselves want to do... and not what others want them to do. I understand some hardliners may have a problem with that, just as there may be with our call for contraception. But in the real world you can’t take a selective approach to these complex issues.”

Foetus frenzy
Casa’s outburst last Saturday was the latest in a gradual accumulation of references to abortion by the Ntaionalist government: strongly suggesting that, notwithstanding a clear political consensus on the issue, abortion is likely to come to the forefront of the next election campaign.

This is consistent with the direction Lawrence Gonzi has taken the party since his election as leader in 2004.

Among Gonzi’s first acts as Prime Minister was in fact to personally endorse the Gift of Life Foundation’s crusade to entrench an abortion ban in the Constitution – despite the fact that the procedure is already illegal in Malta, and that all three mainstream parties have on countless occasions declared themselves to be pro-life.

In some cases, the borderlines between government of GOL have been blurred. In 2005, former Justice Minister Tonio Borg made extensive use of government assets to help propagate the same supposedly non-governental organisation’s campaign: sending thousands of letters from his government ministry, all bearing the official ministry letterhead, ‘urging’ civil society to support the initiative.

Predictably, the same Gift of Life Foundation this week echoed the official Nationalist line to the letter: issuing a statement yesterday to deplore the Labour MEPs’ support for the Cashman report, and to praise the Nationalist MEPs for voting against.

Speaking informally to this newspaper last week, a Labour insider remarked that the insistence of the PN and its allies on playing the abortion card was indicative of the fact that the party in government, having previously campaigned for EU membership, had now run out of electoral gimmicks.

“They have nothing else to fight us on, so they have to resort to nonsense like this,” he said.