The 2022 election has come to an end, although there are many seats in Parliament that still need to be filled.
With a total of 16 casual elections that need to take place, and the gender corrective mechanism to kick in afterwards, we still have an incomplete picture of Malta’s Parliament.
Regardless, many things changed since 2017 – candidates who were popular five years ago, were not elected. Some new star candidates are now in the spotlight, having been elected on the first count.
The Labour Party has indicated which districts candidates, who were elected on two, are ceding. On the PN side of things, the party’s statute requires PN candidates, elected on two districts, to vacate the seat where he or she received the lowest percentage of first count votes, as a percentage of the district quota.
Casual elections will need to take place for seats ceded by Prime Minister Robert Abela, Clyde Caruana, Owen Bonnici, Chris Fearne, Ian Borg, Silvio Schembri, Michael Falzon, Clifton Grima and Miriam Dalli for the PL. For the PN, casual elections will need to take place for seats ceded by PN Leader Bernard Grech, Adrian Delia, Stephen Spiteri, Ryan Callus, Joe Giglio, Robert Arrigo and Mark Anthony Sammut.
In the casual elections the votes of the candidates giving up their seats are distributed among the contesting candidates according to voter preference. All candidates will start from zero and only the votes of the candidate who ceded the seat will be counted. While it is hard to predict which way such votes will go, what could give an indication of popularity in a district is to look at those who were the closest to being elected, but missed out.
District 1
The first district saw a couple of newcomers elected.
The PL’s Keith Azzopardi Tanti gained widespread support, being elected on the very first count with 3,774 votes.
Azzopardi Tanti was the mayor of Pieta. He was one of the candidates who was endorsed by former Prime Minister Joseph Muscat.
The other two PL MPs elected were Aaron Farrugia and Deo Debattista, both of whom were elected on this district in 2017.
Former Minister Jose Herrera did not receive enough votes to be elected this year. In 2017, he had been elected on the first count.
The second newcomer is the PN’s Darren Carabott. He was elected on the same count as veteran Mario de Marco, but ended up with more inherited votes.
Carabott replaced Claudio Grech, who was elected in 2017 but did not contest the 2022 election.
In terms of voting percentages, the PL won 60.1% of the vote in 2022, compared to 57.2% in 2017. Meanwhile the PN won 37.6% of the vote in 2022, which is less than the 41.7% in 2017.
District 2
Robert Abela received a whopping 11,694 first count votes on this district, which saw a number of seasoned politicians and MPs from the last legislature contesting. Carmelo Abela, Chris Agius, Glenn Bedingfield, Byron Camilleri, Clyde Caruana, Joe Mizzi and Oliver Scicluna were all vying for votes.
Aside from Abela, three other PL MPs were elected. Caruana and Agius were the two MPs from the last legislature who received the required votes to be elected from this district. A newcomer to Malta’s Parliament won the fourth Labour seat – Alison Zerafa Civelli, who is the sister of Robert Abela’s wife, Lydia. She was also the mayor of Cospicua.
While a number of the seasoned PL MPs were elected on other districts, Joe Mizzi, Glenn Bedingfield and Oliver Scicluna were not.
Caruana will be ceding his seat in this district. James Grech was the PL candidate who was closest to being elected but was not.
There were changes when compared to 2017. Joseph Muscat had been elected on this district with 14,674 first count votes, which is higher than the number of votes Abela received this year. Mizzi and Agius were elected in 2017, as was Helena Dalli, who eventually became a European Commissioner. When Muscat resigned from Parliament last legislature, Caruana had been co-opted to fill his seat. Bedingfield had won a casual election to replace Dalli in 2017.
On the PN side of things, Stephen Spiteri was elected again, confirming the seat he won in 2017.
This was the district where the largest percentage of votes went to the Labour Party. It won 71.2% of the vote, which is the same percentage as 2017. The PN, meanwhile, only managed to get 26.3% of the vote, which is lower than the 27.8% in 2017.
District 3
PL political veterans Chris Fearne, Owen Bonnici and Carmelo Abela were all elected on this district. PL MP Andy Ellul also made it.
While both Fearne and Abela were elected on this district in 2017, the other two PL candidates elected that year were Helena Dalli and Silvio Grixti. Jean Claude Micallef had replaced Dalli through a casual election and Ellul was co-opted when Grixti resigned.
Bonnici will be ceding his seat in this district. The unelected PL candidate who was closest to being elected was Alicia Bugeja Said.
On the PN side of things, Stephen Spiteri was elected. He will be ceding his seat in this district. The PN unelected candidate, who was closest to being elected, was Janice Chetcuti.
Mario Galea had won a seat on this district in 2017, but did not contest the 2022 elections.
During this election the PL won 69% of the votes compared to the PN’s 27.7%. In 2017, the PL won it with 69.9% and the PN had 29%.
District 4
Chris Fearne and Byron Camilleri, who were both ministers in the last legislature, were elected on this district. Both had also been elected here in 2017.
In addition, MP Jonathan Attard, who was co-opted into Parliament in the last term and new MP Chris Bonett were both elected for the PL.
Glenn Bedingfield and Oliver Scicluna contested this district, but were not elected. Deo Debattista was also not elected on this district, but was elected on another.
Fearne will be ceding his seat. The PL candidate who came closest to being elected is Oliver Scicluna.
In 2017, this district had seen Konrad Mizzi and Silvio Parnis elected, as well as Etienne Grech through a casual election. None of the three contested this year.
For the PN, Jason Azzopardi had won the seat in 2017 and Carm Mifsud Bonnici had acquired a seat through a Constitutional mechanism. This year, however, Mark Anthony Sammut won the seat beating out both veteran MPs, who were left without a seat in Parliament.
The PL won the district with 67.6% of the votes to the PN’s 29.5%. This was a similar result to 2017, when the PL won 67.7% of the votes to the PN’s 31.1%.
District 5
The fifth district was an interesting one. Robert Abela and Bernard Grech both contested it and were both elected.
It is the very same district Joseph Muscat contested in 2017.
Aside from Abela and Grech, the PL’s Miriam Dalli, Owen Bonnici, Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi were elected. The PN’s Toni Bezzina was elected to a seat on this district through a constitutional proportionality mechanism.
Both Abela and Grech will be ceding their seats in this district. Most of the PL heavyweights who contested on this district were elected. Omar Farrugia was the PL candidate with the most votes out of those not elected. In Grech’s case, Stanley Zammit was the closest PN candidate to being elected.
In 2017, Joseph Muscat, Owen Bonnici, Julia Farrugia Portelli, Toni Bezzina and Herman Schiavone were elected, with Zrinzo Azzopardi winning a casual election after Muscat dropped this district.
This shows that the PN lost a seat in this district this year when compared to 2017, if one doesn’t take Bezzina’s seat through the Constitutional mechanism into account.
In 2022 the PL won 65.2% of the votes while the PN won 31.8%. In 2017, the PL won 65.7% of the votes and the PN won 33.3%.
District 6
A new MP was elected for the PN on this district – Jerome Caruana Cilia. He was elected on the first count, ahead of the other PN MP elected from this district – Ryan Callus. Callus had also been elected from the sixth in 2017, and the other PN MP elected at the time was Clyde Puli, who did not contest the 2022 election.
The three PL MPs elected on this district are Silvio Schembri, Roderick Galdes and Ian Borg. In 2017, Robert Abela had been elected on this district together with Schembri and Galdes. Rosianne Cutajar had been elected through a casual election replacing Silvio Schembri soon after.
This year, Borg will be ceding this seat. The PL candidate who was closest to being elected was Cutajar.
The PL won this district with 60.6% of the vote, while the PN got 37.3%. In 2017 the PL received 59.4% of the votes and the PN 39.7%.
District 7
Three PL MPs were elected on this district in 2022 – Ian Borg, Silvio Schembri and Julia Farrugia Portelli.
Schembri will be ceding his seat. The PL candidate who came closest to being elected on this district was Malcolm Paul Agius Galea.
Two PN MPs, Adrian Delia and Ryan Callus, were also elected from District 7. A third PN candidate, Ian Vassallo, was elected through the Constitutional proportionality mechanism.
Both Delia and Callus will be ceding their seats given that they were elected on two districts. Ian Vassallo was closest to being voted in through this district for the PN, but since he has already been appointed through the Constitutional proportionality mechanism, will not contest the casual election. The next two candidates who were closest to being elected for the PN were Rebekah Cilia and Charles Azzopardi.
Between the 2017 and 2022 elections, this district saw many different MPs. In 2017, Borg and Schembri were elected for the PL, in addition to Edward Scicluna. For the PN, Beppe Fenech Adami and Jean Pierre Debono had been elected. Fenech Adami ceded his seat and Godfrey Farrugia was elected through a casual election. Edward Scicluna later resigned, to be replaced by Gavin Gulia, who also resigned, which opened up room for the PL to co-opt Oliver Scicluna. Jean Pierre Debono later resigned with the intention being for Adrian Delia, when he became PN Leader, to take up the seat. For this to happen, a casual election was needed, which Peter Micallef won. Micallef resigned right after taking the Oath of Office and Adrian Delia was able to be co-opted.
The Labour Party won 55.5% of the votes on this district, to the PN’s 41.4%. In 2017, the PL had won 56.4% to the PN’s 42.2%
District 8
Three PN candidates were elected on this district. They are newcomer Justin Schembri, veteran MP Beppe Fenech Adami and former PN Leader Adrian Delia.
For the PL, Clyde Caruana and Edward Zammit Lewis were elected.
This district looked very different in 2017. The PN’s three elected candidates back then were Beppe Fenech Adami, Therese Comodini Cachia and David Agius. For the PL, Scicluna and Chris Cardona had been elected. Comodini Cachia, Scicluna and Cardona did not contest in 2022. Scicluna and Cardona were eventually replaced by Zammit Lewis and Ian Castaldi Paris, when Scicluna ceded this district in 2017 and Cardona resigned from Parliament.
This year the PN won this district with 52.2% of the votes to the PL’s 44.4%. In 2017, the PN had won 52.9% of the votes to the PL’s 45.5%.
District 9
Lawyer Joe Giglio, who is new to politics, Robert Arrigo and Ivan J. Bartolo were elected on this district for the PN this year.
Both Giglio and Arrigo will be ceding their seats on this district. Eve Borg Bonello and Noel Muscat were the two PN candidates who were otherwise closest to being elected, however former MPs Karol Aquilina, Jason Azzopardi and Karl Gouder all contested the election on this district and were not elected.
For the PL, Clifton Grima and Michael Falzon were elected. Both will be ceding their seats. This means that Rebecca Buttigieg will automatically be elected as the other PL candidate on this district. The PL has also already announced that as a result of this, Randolph Debattista will be co-opted to Parliament in order to take the second seat.
In 2017, the elected MPs on the district were Kristy Debono, Robert Arrigo and Marthese Portelli for the PN, Clifton Grima and Michael Falzon for the PL. Manuel Mallia for the PL and Ivan J. Bartolo for the PN had been later elected through casual elections for the seats of Falzon and Portelli. Bartolo later gave up his seat for Bernard Grech when the latter was elected PN Leader.
The PN won this district with 55.9% of the votes to the PL’s 40.7%. In 2017, the PN had won the district with 56.3% to the PL’s 42%.
District 10
Joe Giglio, Robert Arrigo and Mark Anthony Sammut were elected for the PN on this district.
Sammut will be ceding this seat. Former MP Karol Aquilina was the closest PN candidate to getting elected after the three who were.
Michael Falzon and Clifton Grima were elected for the Labour Party.
In 2017, Arrigo, Marlene Farrugia and Karl Gouder were elected for the PN, with Aquilina getting a seat through a casual election after Arrigo had ceded his seat. For the PL, Evarist Bartolo and Falzon had been elected.
The PN won this district with 58.7% of the votes to the PL’s 37%. Independent candidate Arnold Cassola did remarkably well on this district, winning 2% of the vote.
In 2017, the PN won 60.3% of the votes to the PL’s 38.1%.
District 11
PN Leader Bernard Grech and Ivan Bartolo and David Agius were elected on this district.
For the PL, Miriam Dalli and Alex Muscat were elected. Dalli will be ceding her seat on this district. Anthony Agius Decelis was the PL candidate with the most votes not to be elected on this district.
In 2017, Simon Busuttil, David Agius and Edwin Vassallo were elected on this district for the PN, with Ivan Bartolo and Maria Deguara later being elected through a casual election for seats ceded by Busuttil and Agius. While Bartolo was elected from a different district in 2022, both Deguara and Vassallo were not. For the PL, Agius Decelis and Muscat had been elected in 2017.
The PN won the district with 53.3% of the votes to the PL’s 42.1%. In 2017, the PN won the district with 55.2% of the votes to the PL’s 43%.
District 12
District 12 was very close this year and almost swung red. The PN won the district with 49.5% of the votes to the PL’s 46.8%. There was just a 584-vote gap between the two parties. In 2017, the PN had won the district with 51% of the votes to the PL’s 47.5%.
Ivan Castillo, Robert Cutajar and Graziella Galea were elected for the PN on this district. It is the first time Castillo and Galea were elected as MPs, although Galea had been co-opted towards the end of the last legislature.
For the PL, Clayton Bartolo and Michael Farrugia were elected.
In 2017, Simon Busuttil, Michael Farrugia, Evarist Bartolo, Robert Cutajar and Claudette Buttigieg had been elected, with Clayton Bartolo and David Thake later winning casual elections for seats ceded by Bartolo and Busuttil.
Neither Claudette Buttigieg nor Evarist Bartolo won a seat on this district in 2022.
District 13
This district saw a new PN candidate being elected on the first count. Alex Borg proved to be extremely popular for the PN, being elected ahead of PN veteran Chris Said (the other PN MP elected from this district).
Borg’s election meant that former PN MPs Claudette Buttigieg, Kevin Cutajar and Joseph Ellis did not get a seat.
For the PL, Clint Camilleri, Anton Refalo and Jo Etienne Abela were elected, the latter also being a new face to Malta’s Parliament.
In 2017, Refalo, Justyne Caruana and Camilleri were elected for the PL, while Said and Marthese Portelli were elected for the PN. Frederick Azzopardi had been elected through the Constitutional proportionality mechanism. David Stellini was elected through a casual election for the seat ceded by Portelli. He later resigned. Kevin Cutajar was then co-opted to Parliament.
The PL won this district with 53.5% of the votes to the PN’s 43.9%. In 2017, the PL had won with 51.2% of the vote to the PN’s 47.9%.