ADPD candidate Mina Tolu has made an interesting observation on the gender corrective mechanism. She argued that the mechanism backfired as less people voted for women knowing that they would be elected anyway. Ironically, this backfired on one of the mechanism’s greatest proponents: Rosianne Cutajar, the corrupt Minister who conspired and slept with Yorgen Fenech. Rosianne didn’t get elected on the first count and therefore she will be missing out on the ministry that Robert Abela promised her. She may eventually get elected with the casual election or with the gender corrective mechanism itself later on and may have what she was promised later with a cabinet reshuffle.
There’s a very serious and obvious reason why the gender corrective mechanism is absolutely wrong and anti-democratic. In the case that voters may have rejected Rosianne Cutajar for her corruption, the gender corrective mechanism would have saved her seat in parliament. This is wrong in many ways. Feminists who worked with Robert Musumeci to draw up this bill should have known in advance that working with corrupt rent-seekers would lead to bizarre results. Labour is getting each of its legal reforms wrong and special interest groups should lobby to get things right rather than accepting eagerly every bone thrown at them.
There’s also something extraordinary in Rosianne’s failure to get elected on the first count. Joseph Muscat’s word counts for nothing.
Good point. Its going to be a very intetrsting month coming up over the casual elections