Labour deputy leader Anglu Farrugia stepped down as deputy leader for party affairs, following his comments that Magistrate Audrey Demicoli acted with political bias.
A Labour Party executive committee meeting was held in the afternoon during which Dr Farrugia presented his resignation. During the meeting, a letter Dr Muscat sent to party president Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi was read.
In it, Dr Muscat explained that declarations such as those made by Dr Farrugia were not to be made as they undermined the judiciary. Dr Muscat had a meeting with Dr Farrugia, in the presence of the deputy leader for party affairs, Toni Abela, following which Dr Farrugia was asked to resign.
Addressing a press conference hastily called up, Labour Leader Joseph Muscat said that he had requested Dr Farrugia to resign following the comments he made last Sunday.
Dr Muscat said that Dr Farrugia stood by the comments he made but accepted to resign as a sign of loyalty towards the party.
Asked whether Dr Farrugia will be contesting the election, Dr Muscat said that the sacrifice he paid was a huge one but he was given to believe that Dr Farrugia will most likely not contest the election in March.
Dr Muscat denied that former PL secretary general Jason Micallef, a rival to Dr Farrugia on the Mosta district, was behind any of the developments.
The resignation comes days after Dr Farrugia took part in a highly controversial debate with PN deputy Simon Busuttil on the PBS programme Xarabank. Dr Farrugia had given up his place to Nationalist rebel backbencher Franco Debono the night before, but the programme was cancelled because PBS did not accept the change. It was held on Saturday.
The Labour Party will now be holding a quick election to appoint a deputy leader instead of Dr Farrugia.
Nominations will be accepted Friday and Saturday, and the election will be hld next week, on Thursday and Friday, during an extraordinary general conference.
Dr Muscat said that the decision to hold a quick election for a deputy leader comes from the fact that the country is on the eve of an election campaign.
The Nationalist Party, in a first reaction, said that the election of Dr Busuttil as PN deputy leader had forced the PL to take immediate action. Its decision to replace Dr Farrugia with Dr Debono last Friday already meant that the PL was trying to hide Dr Farrugia. What happened afterwards showed the state of panic that the Labour Party is in, the PN said.