The petition calling for a vote of confidence on Adrian Delia has been forwarded to the PN's executive council, the President of the party's general council said.
The request was handed over to the executive committee despite the fact that 28 signatures were invalid and many others came from councillors with expired memberships.
Earlier on Wednesday, a party spokesperson said that the signatures were being verified. In a statement in the afternoon, the president of the general council, Kristy Debono, said that 84 out of 200 signatures were invalid or were signed by people with expired membership.
The petition was presented to the PN on Tuesday afternoon. According to the statute, such a petition must be signed by at least 150 members of the general council.
Debono said 23 of those who had signed are not members of the general council and another five had refused or failed to pay their membership.
Another 14 members had last paid their tesserae in 2017, and 41 had last paid it in 2018.
There was one case where the name and surname of a signatory had not tallied with the name on the person's ID card.
Debono said that, after the necessary verification exercise was carried out, according to Article 31 of the party statute, she was forwarding the request of the councillors to the party's executive committee so that the process to convene a general council and set the agenda could start.
A spokesperson clarified that the request is being forwarded since those with expired memberships are still in time to renew their tessera.