Election Desk: If you can’t beat them, join the other ones

Welcome to the Election Desk. This is where we round up the major headlines of the last 24 hours, together with some of the more light-hearted and funnier sides of the campaign trail.

The defector

Conrad Borg Manche spent nine years as Gżira’s mayor, first under Labour and then as an independent after resigning from the party in 2023. He clashed with the PL over plenty of development projects, fought to keep a fuel station off the Council of Europe Garden, and was a key figure in the battle for public access to Manoel Island.

And this week, he submitted his nomination as a Nationalist Party candidate.The move is less surprising than it sounds. Borg Manche left Labour not because he changed his values but he feels that the party did.  Whether the PN will be a natural home for someone with a track record like his on development and public space  is something that will play out as the campaign progresses – and more so if he gets elected into parliament. 

Borg Manché during a protest in 2023. Photo: Matthew Mirabelli

Nanna and nannu, this one’s for you

The PN rolled out some proposals for older people on Monday. Alex Borg pledged that a PN government would raise the state pension by €650 each year, while grandparents caring for toddlers under three would receive a €2,000 grant per child. The latter measure would run parallel to the existing free childcare system. 

Other pledges include increases to tax rebates for private pensions, higher grants for elderly people choosing to remain in their own homes, and a free GP service with home medicine delivery. However, PN MP Paula Mifsud Bonnici stopped short of confirming whether this meant that children in the care of their grandparents would no longer be eligible for free childcare services when pressed on the matter.

Graham Bencini, Alex Borg and Paula Mifsud Bonnici speaking on Monday. Photo: Jonathan Borg

Ex-PMs weight in

Former prime ministers Alfred Sant and Lawrence Gonzi have both called for binding legal safeguards to prevent governments from abusing their power of incumbency. 

Sant said Malta’s preference for personal, friend-to-friend dealings over institutional mechanisms undermines any attempt to regulate incumbency abuse. Gonzi even went further, proposing a government recruitment freeze during elections and suggesting that the auditor general be given explicit powers to scrutinise pre-election spending and appointments.

Predictably, both referred to abuses of the opposing party when in government. Sant accused the PN of using its power of incumbency to win the 2003 and 2008 elections, while Gonzi accused the Labour government of employing 8,000 people across the public service before the 1987 general election. But beneath the partisan framing, there are legitimate arguments in favour of curbing the power of incumbency enjoyed by the party in government. 

Former prime ministers Alfred Sant, left, and Lawrence Gonzi.

Sign on the dotted line

Nominations continued to roll in on Monday, and now we have Robert Abela’s name on the official list. Abela will contest the second and fifth districts, as he did in 2022.

Meanwhile, Alex Borg will contest his home district of Gozo and the 12th district covering Mġarr, Mellieħa, St Paul’s Bay and Burmarrad. As at the time of writing, the electoral commission has received 282 nominations.

To view the full list, take a look at the Electoral Commission’s website here.

Robert Abela, Prime Minister and Labour Party leader, will contest the second and fifth districts. Photo: PL