The Nationalist Party is considering taking some kind of action against its outgoing assistant secretary general Jean Pierre Debono for the way he handled proxy votes in the election for party leader, Times of Malta reports.

It followed a story published on Malta Today which reported that Debono had collected a member’s voting document through a proxy which was issued without the member’s consent.

But in a lengthy post on Faceook, the MP said what he did was out of duty and that he did not know the favourite candidate of the voter.

Malta Today reported that Debono was rebuked for failing to identify the identity of voters who had made use of the proxies, more so because he was not personally present when the proxy was signed.

In comments to The Times, former leader Simon Busuttil and outgoing secretary general Rosette Thake said that the report did not cast any doubts on the integrity of the election, and that they felt no need to postpone it. Both Busuttil and Thake learnt of Debono’s behaviour on the eve of the vote.

The matter has now been put before the party’s administrative committee for further consideration.

Explaining his position Debono said that no documents were falsified and the proxies were made available to elderly persons for them not to wait for long hours to collect their vote. He said he had explained his position to the Electoral Commission in writing.

Malta Today’s report did not reflect the whole truth, Debono said, adding that it was a desperate attempt to undermine the work of new leader Adrian Delia. He asked how a sensitive report had ended up in the media, adding that such behaviour showed that there were still persons who spoke about uniting the party and then behaving in the opposite way.