When we voted for Malta’s EU accession, we showed we wanted freedom and good governance to be our standard bearers. We wanted stability and a good future. We wanted peace and economic wellbeing.

This is why on Saturday I will choose candidates on the PN ticket and a few other chosen candidates. I will not waste my vote.

I will not vote for Labour Party candidates because they do not uphold all the values I cherish, the values that always attracted me to the EU: freedom of expression fully respected with no reserve and adherence to the rule of law at all times.

At the moment the PN is in a sorry place. I admit to vote for any candidates connected to the party needs true courage. Courage and near-blind trust in the ones chosen. Confidence that they will rise above the party and really set it right by giving it the shake-up which will prevent it going down in history as the party which imploded or became a relic of its past.

We need to choose candidates like Roberta Metsola and David Casa. They fought to give back to Malta a semblance of security—not necessarily in the streets but in our hearts. Individuals who, for denouncing the horrors perpetrated in Malta, are branded traitors.

Malta deserves better and needs more of a shakeup than the PN.

Yet I will not just vote PN.

I will include, in my vote, the PD party, some AD candidates, Arnold Cassola and Antoine Borg. I will do so because I sincerely believe a new politics should sprout in Malta, where diverse views will be given more strength.

There is another important reason why we should all vote and make sure we do so analytically. We should not just choose who we would like to represent us. We should also do our best to exclude those we do not want as our representatives. I definitely do not want Norman Lowell to be elected.

All should be done to stop Lowell. To do this you should all vote and think strategically and act tactically. If you want to vote for the so-called smaller parties as a protest vote or because the PN has problems, do so. But do not stop there. Stick a peg on your nose, go ahead and vote for the PN candidates you think are closest to your values and beliefs.

If the Labour Party were not so corrupt and in total conflict with good governance, I would suggest to go on voting for them or some of their candidates.

By voting tactically you will ensure that Norman Lowell will not be elected by default on Saturday. I believe in diversity—he is intrinsically tied to intolerance, racism and bigotry. That is hardly what Europe needs.