Independent MEP candidate Arnold Cassola has taken Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, accusing him of dirty games after Facebook has been refusing his advertisements for the past 15 days.

“For the last 15 days,” Cassola said in a statement, “Facebook has been refusing the majority of my paid adverts, always citing as a motivation that they go against Facebook policy.

“In the past two days everything has been refused, despite the fact that I have shown Facebook that they are wrong since my adverts comply completely with their advertising policies.”

In a letter he sent to Zuckerberg, he noted that he has also deposited his identity card with Facebook.

He added in his correspondence, “On the other hand, Facebook is being inundated with PN and PL adverts.  They do not seem to have any problem.

“People are informing me that ‘It's not Facebook that came up with the block. It is your adversaries, who are masters of Facebook manipulation, that systematically report their opponents in great numbers so that the system shuts off that person".

“So, there cannot be any more adverts from me on Facebook, which is my only way of communicating with voters, since apart from yesterday's [Tuesday’s] five minutes [on PBS], I am ignored by all Maltese TV stations.”

He added in his letter to Zuckerberg, “You are just discriminating against me as a political candidate. Are you interested in favouring other political parties in the European Parliament elections in Malta?

“I am beginning to believe that you really teamed up with Cambridge Analytica to influence elections in the USA and now you are doing the same thing in Malta.

“Shameful of you Mr Zuckerberg. Are you trying to distort the rules of democracy?"