The PN can rightly claim to have come out victorious in these local council elections. It is true that Labour won in terms of votes and percentages, but it is also true that the gap or difference between both parties has diminished. In real and absolute votes, Labour won this election, but Dr Busuttil can rightly claim to have diminished the gap against all odds.

I will not go into the reasons why this gap was diminished, but I would say that it could have been an even bigger victory if Dr Busuttil had supported the no vote in the Hunting Referendum. I know a number of Nationalists who abstained in the local councils because Dr Busuttil declared his position in favour of the Yes vote. PN candidates who lobbied for the No vote did well. For example, Graziella Schembri got elected despite furious competition from other stronger candidates. Graziella Schembri was one who campaigned for a “No” vote in the hunting referendum on her Facebook page. Considering Gzira to be a Labour locality, she got an impressive number of first votes. Although she did not use her maiden surname Attard Previ, which would have given her a political advantage, as her name would have been first of the list, she still got elected on the first count

But Dr Busuttil struck another victory. It is clear that within the PN, not everybody is pulling the same rope. There are many eyeing the post-Simon Busuttil era. Most probably, this result will bring a change of perception within the PN. And the first signs are already there. Those in the PN who were thinking that the Party could not make it will have a change of heart after this electoral result. Thus Dr Simon Busuttil won against what in anthropology is normally considered a passive resistance from within the party and a hostile English press. Despite all this resistance, the PN still succeeded in lowering the gap by half.

On his part, Dr Busuttil should avoid to translate this result into a political deception, as happened to Dr Alfred Sant, when he declared that the partnership won after the EU referendum.

The reality is that victories are now decided by social media, and the winning language here is Maltese not English. Secondly, and more importantly, Dr Busuttil had scored the third victory as many Maltese, both Nationalists and genuine Labourites disagree at heartwith a clique of individuals who are portraying themselves as the kingmakers of Maltese politics. These individuals had a good life under the Nationalists andare still enjoying a good life under Dr Joseph Muscat. I am sure that Labour is having its first casualties due its wrong political choices and alliances.

A phenomenon that went unnoticed was the increase in the number of invalid votes in this local election. Normally, the number of invalid votes is around 2,000. In this last local election, it ran to 7,000. I think that this was mostly to the detriment of the Labour Party. Many Labourites made reference to this when they decided to invalidate their votes, giving their reasons for invalidating the vote on the ballot paper itself. Some specifically wrote down that they disagree with how Labour is treating certain individuals who until recently were militants in the opposite camp.

In others words, these Labour and PN results have a statistical precedent.

One needs to remember that Labour obtained an overwhelming victory in the EU elections of 2009. Practically, Labour obtained around 57% of the popular vote. However, Labour drastically decreased this advantage in the Referendum of Divorce, which Labour supported whole heartedly. In that Referendum, Labour lost around 20,000 votes and the difference with the PN went down by half, reacting the 53% mark of the popular vote. Many thought that this was another victory for Labour, although it wasn’t. However, no one spoke of a decrease in support. Yet, Labour expressed the capacity to recover these lost votes as in the next election, the party was again in the 57% mark.

One has to admit that the situation then was different from what it is now. The PN failed to make a correct reading of the Divorce Referendum result and instead of working on consolidating that vote, which was finally a good one for the party, it started to run after the lost votes, with the result that it helped Labour indirectly to recover its lost vote. This same mistake was again committed by the PN in the EU elections of 2014. It did not work on consolidation but on recovering votes by appearing liberal. This proved disastrous for a Conservative Party. This mistake was not repeated in the last Local Council election and the party worked on the consolidation of its base, and the result was immediately visible. Now, one needs to wait how Labour will react to this situation and what is going to be the next move of the PN party.

Without doubt, these trends are confirming my predictions, when I interpreted the 2013 election result on the National TV station. At that moment, when the figures started to come in, during a live programme, I stated that these swings are going to become a natural occurrencein our elections and no politician should carry on banking onelectoral past models, when a major result would guarantee a party a long term in government. Therefore, the political game is still wide open for both political parties. The way how the respective leadership in both parties will be reacting in the coming months will show us which is the party that will gain or lose votes.