The Executive Council of the Nationalist Party will choose the person to be co-opted in the coming days, a spokesperson for the Nationalist Party said.

Stellini resigned from Malta’s Parliament to return to his posting in Brussels with the European People’s Party.

Following the resignation of David Stellini, it was explained by the spokesperson that “there are a number of valid people who can be co-opted for the post”.

The resignation of David Stellini from the House of Representatives has opened up another internal fight within the Nationalist Party.

On Tuesday night it was announced that the Gozitan MP had called it a day, less than two years after winning his seat, to take up a job in Brussels.

This decision, which had been in the air for quite some time, will lead to an eventual replacement for the PN on the Opposition benches.

And this is where the internal issues within the PN have come out in the open, once again.

The faction that is behind leader Adrian Delia is pushing for the co-option of Jean Pierre Debono, who was elected for the first time in 2017 but who gave up his seat when Delia became party leader in September 2017.

The argument is that Debono made a personal sacrifice and that now he should be rewarded.

But the anti-Delia group has already made its intentions clear via social media messages. People who are known to be at odds with the leadership are insisting that it should be Kevin Cutajar who takes Stellini’s place.

Former PN general secretary Paul Borg Olivier and MPs Karol Aquilina and Jason Azzopardi are arguing that the PN needs to maintain its position in Gozo with a Gozitan MP who, on the whole, had obtained more first preferences than Stellini in the last election, but who was surpassed in following counts.

Their argument is that party interests should prevail over personal matters and that a decision to co-opt Debono would send the wrong message to Gozitan voters.

The resignation of Stellini, who was elected in a casual election, means that the party will have to decide on who to co-opt to Parliament.

Speaking with this newsroom, Jean Pierre Debono said that he will abide by the decision of the Executive Council. If asked to take David Stellini’s place then he will do so, and, if not, then he will bow his head to the will of the EC.

 

Kevin Cutajar was unreachable by the time of publication