Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando

Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando
Member of Parliament
In office 26 October 1996 – 10 March 2013
Personal details
Born	(1963-11-27) 27 November 1963 Sliema, Malta
Domestic partner	Lara Boffa
Children	Jenny Greg Marija

Esplora Planetarium

Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando (born 27 November 1963) is a Maltese former Member of Parliament, and now the executive chairman of the Malta Council for Science and Technology.

Early life

Orlando was educated at De La Salle College, Malta and the University of Malta. He graduated as a dental surgeon in 1987. He lives in Żebbuġ, Malta.

Orlando was very active, politically, as a student. He organised his first demonstration at the age of sixteen against the educational policies of the Socialist regime at the time. He was elected to represent his fellow students on the Faculty Board of the Faculty of Dental Surgery (UOM). He was also very active in the Nationalist Party youth movement (MŻPN).

Political Life

He was the first councillor elected to represent the Nationalist Party on the Żebbuġ Local Council in 1992. He subsequently contested the 1996, 1998, 2003 and 2008 General Elections successfully. He was elected from two districts in the 2008 elections, being the first MP elected from one of them and the Nationalist Party MP to get the greatest number of votes from the other. His total number of first count votes was 5131. A controversy surrounding land he owned at Mistra became a major issue in the run-up to these elections. Joseph Muscat, the leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister, has revealed that this was a mise en scène concocted by the Nationalist Party to discredit his predecessor, Alfred Sant (^[1]). The ruse was instrumental in the PN victory in those elections (^[2]).

He is reported to have been encouraged by 5 successive leaders of the two main political parties in Malta, PN (Nationalist Party) and PL (Labour Party), to contest on their ticket.

Pullicino Orlando accepted to contest the 2017 general elections with the Labour Party on the insistence of Prime Minister Joseph Muscat. Notwithstanding a very short 10 day campaign, he managed to get a good result but failed to get re-elected. His clinic in Zebbug was targeted by arsonists a few days after these elections in what was clearly a politically motivated attack. His candidature with the Labour Party had been met with fierce criticism from die-hard Nationalists.^[3]

He has held the posts of Shadow Minister for Telecommunications, Head of Delegation of the Maltese Parliamentary Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Vice-President of the Assembly and is currently Executive Chairman of the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST).

Malta Council for Science and Technology

He was appointed Chairman of the Council in March 2010 by Nationalist Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi. He has had his term extended twice by the current Labour administration led by Joseph Muscat. Under his stewardship, the MCST has grown considerably. The number of employees has increased from less than 10 in 2010 to over 130 at present. Its remit has expanded to include areas such as Space and PRIMA (Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Area) and there has been an exponential increase in international collaborative initiatives in Research and Innovation (R and I).

He has overseen the development of Malta’s National Interactive Science Centre (Esplora), a state of the art facility which has become one of Malta’s foremost visitor attractions. The development of Esplora involved the rehabilitation of the former Bighi Naval Hospital, which was in a state of imminent collapse, into a 22,000 square metre complex which includes a unique Planetarium and well over 200 interactive exhibits. This complicated project, which was partly financed by EU Structural Funding, was completed in two and a half years. Esplora was inaugurated by Prime Minister Joseph Muscat on 28 October 2016. ^[4]. The Centre was selected by the European Commission as one of the Emblematic Projects for the 30th Anniversary of the Cohesion Policy in April 2018. ^[5]

He is now in the process of developing a new visitor centre, EsploraNatura, which will be focused on Natural History. The project will see the old Natural History Museum in Vilhena Palace being closed and the palace restored to its original glory. The exhibits will be transferred to a new centre on the east side of the Bighi peninsula and the experience will be ameliorated with the addition of several new exhibits and the use of cutting-edge technology.

Notable campaigns

Pullicino Orlando has been involved in a number of notable campaigns. He successfully campaigned against the establishment of a cement plant in the central part of the island which could have had a detrimental impact on his constituents’ health, a waste landfill next to the prehistoric temples of Mnajdra and an underground museum which could have potentially damaged St John's Co-Cathedral in Valletta. He had the wide support of civil society on these issues. These campaigns often brought him at odds with big business concerns.

He militated against abortion in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.[1] He campaigned for the introduction of divorce in Malta in 2011 (Maltese divorce referendum, 2011). He set up what was probably the only political movement in Maltese history to include individuals hailing from all parts of the political spectrum - Moviment IVA ghad-Divorzju, IVA ghaz-zwieg (The pro-divorce movement). This movement successfully campaigned against the joint might of the Nationalist Party in Government and the Church.

He also campaigned for gay rights and was instrumental in the introduction of legislation regulating In Vitro Fertilisation in Malta. Militating in favour of such controversial issues in predominantly Catholic Malta has made him the target of conservative journalists and columnists. Threats to his family have also been reported.

He set up the Anti-Cyberharassment Alliance in August 2013, together with a number of prominent individuals such as the former Chairperson of the pro-divorce movement, Parliamentary Secretary Dr Deborah Schembri, and former minister Jesmond Mugliett. The Alliance successfully put the issues of Cyberharassment and Cyberbullying on the national agenda.^[6]

Independent MP

He resigned from the Nationalist Party (Malta) on 20 July 2012, hence making him an Independent MP. He cited serious differences with high ranking Party officials as the reason for doing so. He did not contest the following elections in 2013.^[7]

References