Labour is on track to win the election by 39,000 votes despite voter turnout dropping to a record low for Maltese general elections, the final poll of the 2022 general election campaign has predicted.
The poll, run by statistician and Labour Party pollster Vincent Marmará for L-Orizzont, forecasts a 55.9 per cent vote share for Robert Abela’s party, versus 42.8 per cent for the Nationalist Party.
His prediction closely mirrors the result forecast by a Times of Malta poll published last week, which had Labour at 55.1 per cent and the PN at 43.5 per cent.
If Marmara’s calculations prove accurate, the result would mark a third consecutive record electoral victory for Labour, improving its share of the vote by 0.9 per cent, and a decline of 0.9 percentage points for the PN from its 2017 election result.
The voting share for third parties and independent candidates is likely to remain unchanged from 2017 at 1.3 per cent, the poll forecasts.
Marmará’s poll predicts 88 per cent turnout – a record low in local general elections, which have never seen turnout dip below the 90 per cent mark.
The poll indicates that 3.8 per cent of voters who backed Labour in 2017 will not be voting, compared to 2.7 per cent of PN voters. That figure reflects growing unease within the Labour camp about disgruntled or apathetic voters opting to stay at home.
The statistician surveyed 1,800 respondents between March 18 and 23 for the poll, which comes with a +/- 2.3% margin of error and 95% confidence interval.
Despite concerns about lower turnout, Labour appears to be more capable of winning over voters than the PN.
Roughly 4.9 per cent of respondents who voted PN in 2017 say that they intend to vote Labour this time around, while just 1.4 per cent of Labour voters last time round say they intend to switch and vote blue.
Undecided voters are also more likely to come from the PN camp, the survey indicates: 13.9 per cent of 2017 PN voters say they are still not sure who to vote for, versus 8.1 per cent of 2017 Labour voters.
Robert Abela continues to enjoy a dominant trust lead over his direct rival Bernard Grech, with 53.5 per cent of voters saying they believe he is the best national leader versus 31 per cent who cited Grech. Almost one in 10 voters – 9.5 per cent – said they do not believe anyone in local politics is fit to lead the country.