Last Monday, after five Nationalist Party candidates were elected on two districts in the general election, the party’s Executive Committee decided which seats should be vacated.

The decision, taken by secret vote, meant that Robert Arrigo, Marthese Portelli, and David Agius were made to cede the seats they won on the districts where they received the largest amount of first count votes.

Regulations for both the PN and PL stipulate that it is the party executive that selects the districts, not the candidates.

The Malta Independent contacted the three PN MPs to get their perspective on the casual election mechanism.

 

Robert Arrigo

Speaking to the newsroom, Robert Arrigo expressed his disappointment at the party executive’s decision to cede his seat of the 10th district (Sliema) by a 55-22 vote.

Arrigo was elected from both the 9th and 10th districts over the weekend, and had increased his votes by 2,000 when compared to the 2013 election.

In an open letter following the general election result, Arrigo said that Busuttil should not have resigned as PN Leader.

He said that in the previous two elections, the party listened to his request to remain on the 10th, however on this occasion he was not offered an explanation to the decision, despite his request for the executive to reverse its decision. “I wrote to them, I spoke to them, asked them to reconsider, but the executive did not accept. It is a closed secret vote and I was never given an explanation.”

 

David Agius

David Aguis told The Malta Independent that  “there are rules which state that executive selects which district a candidate should keep through a vote.”

“I was elected from both, I got the confidence of both, and I leave it to the decision of the executive, which I bow to and accept every time.”

“However, I work whole heartedly on both districts, and I have already started working. I believe in one thing, that if you want to be elected in the next election, you have to start working from now.”

“Tomorrow I will be distributing a ‘thank you’ leaflet in both districts. There is no distinction between them. I got 4,000 votes from both, and I will work to represent both.”

 

Marthese Portelli

Marthese Portelli also stood by the PN executive’s decision but insisted that she will be continuing to work on both districts. Portelli was elected on the 15th count in Gozo, and on the 29th count on the ninth district. The PN executive decided that she should relinquish her 13^th district seat. 

“I will still work on the ground in both districts. In fact I just opened my political office in Gozo.”

Looking at the positives from the decision, particularly with regards to Gozo, Portelli said that Gozitans will see another one of their own elected in Parliament.

 

Ivan Bartolo and David Thake

The decision taken by the Nationalist Party on the districts to be ceded by candidates elected twice has meant that star candidates Ivan Bartolo (above) and David Thake (below) will be missing out on a parliamentary seat, regardless of featuring prominently throughout the campaign.

Bartolo contested the 9^th and 12^th districts and Thake contested the 8^th and 12^th. Both could have had a chance to be casually elected, seeing that all three districts included candidates who were elected twice – Fenech Adami and Agius on the 8^th, Robert Arrigo and Marthese Portelli on the 9^th and Simon Busuttil on the 12^th.

This presents a puzzling issue given that Bartolo was presented as a fresh face with progressive positive ideas within the PN. In fact Bartolo was closely associated with the popular ‘Ideat’ platform.  However, it seems that there was coordinated effort to keep him out of Parliament.

The PN candidate obtained 1,204 votes in the first count.

 

It could be argued that the 10th district was home to PN stalwart George Pullicino, however it remains to be seen why the PN chose to favour electing another candidate from Gozo by dropping Marthese Portelli from the 13^th rather than the 9^th.

In his comments on Facebook, Bartolo said that “politics is no longer on my radar.”

Sources within the Nationalist Party have told The Malta Independent that Bartolo’s lack of lobbying and presence during the meeting of Party executive had a bearing on the outcome of their selection. Two weeks prior to the general elections, when speaking on Indepth, Bartolo had said that if the PN leader Simon Busuttil resigns he would follow.

David Thake on the other hand missed out on two potential casual elections on the 8^th and 12^th districts. This after it was decided that Simon Busuttil should cede his 11^th district seat instead of his 12^th, and David Agius ceded his 11^th district seat instead of his seat on the 8^th.

Thake, who has grassroots support as a result of his radio show, was at centre of the PN’s campaign so much so that the Party found a loophole in the Broadcasting Authority regulations, to allow Thake to continue hosting his show by circumventing legislation. The party did this by making him a ‘guest’ on his own show.

However it appears that he was sacrificed in favour of Mosta Mayor Ivan Bartolo (not to be confused with the other Ivan Bartolo, founder of 6pm company) and former PN treasurer Alex Perici Calascione, who could both get elected after Aguis and Busuttil gave up their seats in the 11th.

Thake has already spoken out against the current casual election mechanism, and has expressed on social media that the entire party needed a clear out.