The Right To Speak Out: Maltese NGOs Join 200,000-Strong Anti-SLAPP EU Petition
Civil society organisations and SLAPP lawsuit victims have delivered a petition with over 200,000 signatures to EU Commission Vice-President Vĕra Jourová.
A SLAPP is a strategic lawsuit against public participation and is done with the intention to censor, intimidate and even silence critics by burdening them with the cost of a legal defense until they abandon their criticism or opposition.
It also means that the wealthy and powerful could manipulate the law to force their critics into time-consuming and costly legal proceedings aimed at silencing them.
Groups such as the Coalition for Women in Journalism, European Studies Organization, Malta and Maltese NGOs Aditus, Repubblika, and PEN Malta, have joined the call.
The petition was launched in July 2021 by two organisations; Rainforest Rescue and the Munich Environmental Institute, both of whom are facing SLAPPs.
At the time they called upon the European Commission to propose anti-SLAPP laws to protect those affected by similar legal attacks.
The number of victims of such cases has risen in recent years. As a result, persons who have been cast out for public participation, public-interest journalism, peaceful protests, boycotting, advocacy or whistleblowing are now speaking out.
One outspoken critic against such suits is journalist Matthew Caruana Galizia, who was no stranger to such cases, even in youth.
“I had seen the effects of the many defamation suits against my mother. Growing up, I thought these kinds of lawsuits were normal and it’s the price you had to pay for being a journalist,” Caruana Galizia had said in June 2021.
“It was when I met other journalists that I learned this was not normal and it is not something journalists should endure,” Caruana Galizia said.
Given the threat to fundamental rights wrought by such legal pursuits, CASE (Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe) has effectively pleaded that the EU impose strong laws in order to safeguard our society’s democratic values, of which at the very least, include freedom of speech and expression.
SLAPP is currently on the European Parliamentary agenda with EP President Roberta Metsola spearheading the initiative while she was serving as an MEP.
Do you think the EU should impose strict anti-SLAPP rules?