On Friday, the President of the European Parliament Pat Cox started an official two-day visit in Malta. During a joint press conference with the Maltese Prime Minister Lawrence Gonz, Pat Cox's main message was to urge the Maltese to keep up the traditional high participation turnout and to vote in Members of the European Parliament elections on 12 June. He also urged the Maltese voters to make the most out of the full membership now that Malta is officially a member state in the European Union (EU).
Pat Cox said that the opportunity to elect five representative members in the European Parliament is a unique opportunity for Malta.
After a working lunch with the Prime Minister, Pat Cox and Dr Gonzi discussed the role of political groups in the European Parliament who are in a minority. Pat Cox remarked that in Brussels all the groups are in a minority and emphasized that each group has its own role to mobilize a majority. Dr Gonzi and Pat Cox also spoke about the EU Constitution, its progress and difficulties.
Pat Cox reminded that the European Parliament is the only institution that enables the citizen to get close to the EU by means of its members who have the opportunity to voice out their opinions. He augured that the Maltese will take the maximum from this benefit. H also added that Malta has an important contribution to give to this parliament politically and also as a Mediterranean experience.
Pat Cox also met the leader of the Opposition Alfred Sant, the chairperson of Alternattiva Demokratika Harry Vassallo and the Speaker of the House of Representatives Anton Tabone. He also met the members of the Standing Committee on Foreign and EU Affairs of the House of Representatives and the President of Malta Edward Fenech Adami.
Pat Cox said that from information he was given, the voting turn-out in Malta will be a strong one as for example Opposition Leader Dr Alfred Sant mentioned a probable 88% voting. Dr Sant and Pat Cox discussed the different electoral systems in Malta and Ireland. They also discussed the details in the local electoral campaigns.
The chairperson of Alternattiva Demokratika Harry Vassallo mentioned to Pat Cox the need that the members of the European Parliament contribute to a free election that will have a qualitative majority which gains the support of all the parties.
Pat Cox's official visit will end on Saturday 5 June 2004.
Pat Cox has been a Member of the European Parliament since 1989, representing the constituency of Munster in the Republic of Ireland. Before entering politics he worked both as an economics lecturer and as a journalist and television presenter on Irish television. Both of these careers have been of benefit to him in his political work.
He was first elected President of the European Liberal Democrat Group in 1998 and then was unanimously re-elected as Group President in June 1999 following the elections to the European Parliament. The European Liberal Democrats are the third largest political grouping in the European Parliament and they bring together MEPs from 19 Liberal Democrat parties.
After several achievements in his political career, in 1994 he had been successfully re-elected to the European Parliament, this time as an Independent Member, and was nominated to be the Deputy Leader of the European Liberal Democrats, a position in which he became a key individual in the development of the Group political strategy and policy, culminating in his nomination to the Programme Committee which drew up the 1999 election manifesto for Liberal Democrats throughout Europe. This programme was subsequently adopted at the European Liberal Democrat Party Congress in April 1999 in Berlin. In 1998 when a vacancy presented for the Presidency of the ELDR Group, he was unanimously elected to that position.
On behalf of the European Liberal Democrats Pat Cox exercised a key role in insisting on executive accountability of the European Commission before the European Parliament. This led in March 1999 to the unprecedented resignation of the European Commission. After the 1999 European Parliamentary elections he was re-elected to the post of President of the ELDR Group. Pat Cox was elected President of the European Parliament on 15 January 2002.
© Copyright 2006 - MaltaMedia Online Network
Top of Page
| 
