Watch: ‘We Can’t Keep Being Afraid Of The Babaw’ – Sandra Gauci On Abortion
ADPD MEP candidate Sandra Gauci has urged that Malta needs to stop being “afraid of Babaw” and give women the right to have an abortion.
“A woman who has an abortion is not a criminal,” Gauci said during an MEP candidate debate organised by Lovin Malta, MaltaToday, Ewropej.
“In Malta, she is a criminal because she has no autonomy over her body. No. It’s time for us to move with the times. We were the first party to speak about divorce, the rights of LGBTIQ+ rights, and now abortion. It’s about time that we move with other countries, not that we stay afraid of Babaw,” she continued, referring to the Maltese version of the “bogeyman”.
The mic then turned to PN MEP candidate Louise Anne Pulis who’s response served as a stark contrast, despite agreeing that Malta has failed when it comes to sex education because of the shockingly high syphilis rates.
“I know about the rights of women, but where are the rights of the baby that hasn’t been born? Where are the rights of the men? Once you have life in the womb, you have two sets of competing rights: the rights of the mother and the right of the baby in the womb, as well, if the mother is the field, then the father is the seed.”
Pulis went on to present a problem, saying that if you remove abortion as a crime the principle of nullum crimen sine lege (there’s no crime without a law) comes in which means that if there is no law then it isn’t a crime, and so it will become legal by default.
On the other hand, the PN candidate said that she doesn’t agree with a prison term but agrees with therapy, saying that she’s met with women who have had abortions and “many of them were broken”.
Meanwhile, independent MEP candidate Conrad Borg Manche agreed with Pulis and PL candidate Thomas Bajada did not provide a direct answer on the matter, instead saying that there needs to be a “mature, informed and not politicised discussion”.
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