The Electoral Commission said that three new councillors were elected through casual elections for local councils, to fill the spots left open by newly elected MPs, on Wednesday morning. From five casual elections, two positions remained vacant.
The Local Council Casual Elections were held on Wednesday morning for Yana Borg Debono Grech's seat in Birkirkara, John Baptist Camilleri's seat in Marsascala, Mariah Meli's seat in Għargħur, Conrad Borg Manché's seat in Gżira, and for Anthony Agius Decelis' seat in Mosta.
In Birkirkara, Rita Borg was elected in Borg Debono Grech's place. Borg was the most popular PL candidate to not get elected in 2024, with 254 first-count votes.
Emanuel Camilleri has filled in Mariah Meli's seat within the Għargħur Local Council. He was also the next most popular candidate within the locality back when local council elections were held two years ago.
Danny Farrugia was elected on Wednesday morning to succeed Mosta's minority leader, Anthony Borg Decelis. Farrugia had received the least amount of first-count votes from all candidates in Mosta back in 2024, with 26 first-count votes.
Following Wednesday's local council casual elections, the Marsascala and Gżira local councils have both emerged with a vacant seat. No-one was elected as a councillor in place of Marsascala's minority leader and now PN MP John Baptist Camilleri, and nor for ex-PL Gżira mayor turned PN MP Conrad Borg Manché.
Prior to this year's general election, the Marsascala Local Council featured 11 councillors - seven Labour Party representatives and four Nationalist Party officials. For as long as this vacancy retains itself, Marsascala will have 10 councillors and just three of which coming from the PN, meaning that the Labour Party has now strengthened its already strong majority here.
For Gżira, this now means that its local council now consists of eight councillors that are now exclusively from either the PL or the PN. Borg Manché was elected as a member of this local council in 2024 as an independent candidate and had only garnered less votes than its PL mayor, Neville Chetcuti. From these eight councillors, five members are PL representatives while three are PN councillors.
As a result, despite these two vacancies bringing down the number of local council members in two localities to an even number, neither the Marsascala or Gżira local councils have a 50-50 split of PL and PN councillors. Had this occurred, these local councils could have risked experiencing a power imbalance and regular impasses in local council votes.