Busuttil accuses government of demeaning democracy

Opposition leader Simon Busuttil accused the government of being “anti-democratic” and of not believing in the “decentralisation of power”.

Addressing parliament over the proposed amendments to the Local Councils Act – effectively postponing the 2017 elections to 2019 – Busuttil said the government, “through the undemocratic law” was proposing to cancel the 2017 elections.

“This law shows how much the Labour government is insensitive towards the basic principles that unite our society,” he said.

The government wants local councils elections to be held every five years, along with the European Parliament elections. According to Busuttil, the Justice Minister will go down in Maltese history as the minister “who cancelled an election and weakened democracy”.

The Opposition will be voting against the bill. Busuttil called on the media and civil society to register their opposition to the proposed amendment.

According to Busuttil, the bill was informed of the government’s “need to centralise power”.

“It is evident that the government wants to undermine local councils and their authority. It reduced their financial allocations, introduced arbitrary ways in distributing funds and spreads the notion that local councils are useless.”

Busuttil said the government had tried to justify the proposal by arguing that it was saving money and that the electorate was suffering from electoral fatigue.

He said that the Opposition was in favour of holding local council elections every four years, because five years was the term of a national election. The Opposition’s vision, he said, was to give local councils more autonomy, increase their funds and their platform.

Busuttil said the government was bulldozing over the opposition that existed against the law: “I am sure that the people following this debate are not happy seeing their own Movement taking away their rights.”