Seven candidates have submitted their nomination for the casual election to replace Miriam Dalli at the European Parliament.

They are: Felix Busuttil Galea, Josef Caruana, Cyrus Engerer, Mary Gauci, James Grech, Robert Micallef and Lorna Vassallo.

Dalli resigned her EP seat and was co-opted to the Maltese Parliament in October. She and Clyde Caruana, currently serving as chief of staff to Prime Minister Robert Abela, have filled the seats vacated by former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and Labour MP Etienne Grech.

The casual election will be held on Thursday. Engerer received the highest amount of first count votes from among the non-elected candidates and is considered to be the frontrunner in the casual election.

The Electoral Commission also received five nominations for the casual election on the 13th district. The elected candidate will be taking the seat vacated by PN MP Frederick Azzopardi, who passed away last month.

The candidates who will be contesting the casual election are: Ryan Mercieca, Joseph Ellis, Censu Galea, Maria Portelli and Jason Zammit.

Mercieca obtained the highest number of first-count votes from among the non-elected candidates.

On Saturday, the Nationalist Party disassociated itself from Mercieca, saying its Ethics Commission had been asked to investigate media reports about Mercieca, even in view of a recent court judgement on a libel case that Mercieca had initiated.

Mercieca had initiated the libel suit against it-Torca in January 2016 after a report in the newspaper that he was in a mess for failing to produce documents related to EU funding to an association of NGOs.

Mercieca lost the case in July 2018 after the courts determind that the facts were “substantially correct” and hence cannot be considered defamatory.

It is unclear whether, Mercieca, if elected, would be an independent candidate, robbing the PN of a Parliamentary seat.