Former PN MP and Labour candidate Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando told The Malta Independent that he will “definitely” contest the eventual casual election for the Parliamentary seat that will be vacated by former Finance Minister Edward Scicluna.
After seven years serving as finance minister, Scicluna resigned as minister and will be resigning from his seat in parliament after the government proposed that he be appointed as Governor of the Central Bank, following the appointment of current Governor Mario Vella as Special Commissioner for Economic, Financial and Trade Relations with the UK.
On Saturday 21 November, Prime Minister Robert Abela announced a Cabinet reshuffle which saw four new ministers being appointed while three others had their ministries changed. These changes saw the two recently co-opted members to the PL parliamentary group being given ministerial posts; former MEP Miriam Dalli took over the energy, enterprise and sustainable development portfolio, and former OPM chief of staff Clyde Caruana, as expected, replaced Scicluna as Finance Minister.
Scicluna’s resignation from Parliament (which is expected to occur by the end of the year) will result in the Electoral Commission asking for nominations for a casual election, in order to replace him in parliament. Scicluna had been elected from the 7th district, and three PL candidates from that district were not elected to Parliament. Only those who contested on this district can submit their names for the casual election. Pullicino Orlando, former PL MP and now MTA Chairman Gavin Gulia and former Rabat mayor Charles Azzopardi are the three 2017 PL candidates. If none of them, in the end, submit their names for the election, then the Labour Party would be able to co-opt someone to Parliament, however Pullicino Orlando has already declared his intention.
The Malta Independent contacted all three candidates and asked if they would be interested in contesting the casual election.
“Yes, definitely,” Pullicino Orlando said without any hesitation. Pullicino Orlando is currently the Malta Council for Science and Technology Chairman, but this comes after a long political history which saw him serve as a PN MP and an independent MP (after he broke ties with the PN in 2012). He also contested as a PL candidate in the 2017 elections alongside Gulia and Azzopardi but got the least amount of first count votes out of the three.
On the other hand, Gulia avoided giving such a direct answer, saying that Scicluna is still an MP and that it has not even been confirmed if there will be a casual election for the post, alluding to the possibility of a co-option taking place.
When this newsroom insisted, he said that it is still too early and that one has to think about these things when they actually happen, “if they happen.”
Azzopardi could not be reached prior to the publication of this article. Azzopardi had somewhat of a falling out with the PL in 2019. He had spoken of malicious manoeuvres intended to tarnish his reputation and credibility, and to justify the Labour Party’s decision prohibiting him from representing it in the local council elections that were to take place months later after a report with allegations about the council’s operations was made. If he does contest it would remain to be seen whether, if elected, he would form part of the PL parliamentary group or not.