The stalemate at the Birkirkara local council is set to continue, as another vote to be taken on Monday is not expected to break the deadlock which has limited the council's operations since the election was held in June last year.
The council has not functioned properly for more than a year as the councillors have been unable to agree on electing a mayor.
This will be the ninth vote that councillors will be taking - each time, so far, no agreement has been reached on the new mayor, with Desirei Grech (photo) taking on the role "ad interim" every three months.
If no agreement is reached on Monday, another vote will be taken in seven days, following which, if the stalemate persists, Grech will take on the mayor's role again for another three months.
This situation has prevented the local council from taking long-term decisions, meaning that the council is running its day-to-day operations without there being a possibility of going for projects that could take months, if not years, to complete.
In the 2024 election, neither of the two major parties obtained a majority in Birkirkara with the Nationalist Party and the Labour Party electing six councillors each, and independent candidate Kaylocke Buhagiar getting the 13th seat.
Since then, the councillors have not managed to arrive at an agreement to elect the new mayor, with Grech taking over the role on a temporary basis every three months as she was the candidate which obtained the highest number of votes (1,802) representing the party which picked up the most preferences.
Buhagiar had been on the Labour ticket in the 2019 local council election, but left the party to contest independently in the 2024 vote, and was elected on his own steam.
The PL councillors tried to broker a deal with Buhagiar in the hope of securing a majority on the council. Buhagiar was offered the position of mayor for a period of two and a half years, after which a Labour Party mayor would take over.
Labour councillor, Yana Debono Grech, had stated that Buhagiar rejected the deal, and wanted to be mayor for the whole five years.