As the clock ticked past midnight, the sounds of shouting and banging heard outside Dar Ċentrali indicated another fraught meeting of the Nationalist Party’s executive committee.

Inside, a compromise about a motion on Adrian Delia’s leadership came close to collapse as tempers flared and one member was given a five-minute time-out to cool down. 

At one point, the embattled leader faced accusations of trying to “outsmart” the executive by engineering what PN MP Chris Said dubbed a “one-horse leadership race”. 

Delia kicked off the meeting at 7pm with an unexpected proposal. He wanted a confidence vote in his leadership to be decided on by the party’s members (tesserati) in a general convention. 

Rebel MPs pushed back with their own plan: a vote in the general council, with a motion stating that Delia no longer enjoys the trust of the parliamentary group and executive, and therefore a leadership race should be opened and voted upon by PN members. 

With both sides digging in their heels as the hours ticked by, it fell to PN general secretary Francis Zammit Dimech to try to reach a compromise between the two groups. 

Delia accused of only wanting to save own skin

Zammit Dimech made it clear that executive members could not walk out of the Dar Ċentrali meeting with the scenario of general council meetings with two competing agendas based on the rival motions. 

Delia continued to insist his motion was the “cleanest” option for the party, while dissenters accused him of only being interested in saving his own skin. 

Former PN secretary general Clyde Puli, a Delia supporter, agreed that the PN leader’s motion was the best option, not for himself, but for the party. 

At one stage, Beppe Fenech Adami caused uproar by claiming there were more labourites than nationalists who wanted Delia to stay on as leader. 

The pro-Delia camp in turn flipped the onus on the dissenters, questioning what they would do if Delia again won the PN members’ trust. 

As the 11pm mark approached, a break from the meeting was called with representatives from both sides heading down to the third floor of the four-storey Dar Centrali in an attempt to reach agreement on wording for a single motion. 

The representatives emerged from the side-meeting buoyed after a new motion was drafted with wording acceptable to both sides. 

Backroom compromise attacked

However, the motion agreed upon just moments before came in for heavy fire from Delia loyalist Andre Grech, who disputed the reference to a “new” PN leader being elected. 

There was also bickering on the order of the questions in the compromise motion, which proposed asking the general council whether members should vote in a leadership contest for a new leader or confirm Delia at the PN’s helm. 

An exasperated Chris Said warned that anti-Delia members were ready to write off the whole compromise and instead call for a ruling on the two competing motions, if Delia’s camp continued to propose changes in the text.

Barbs were traded past midnight, as journalists, police and a smattering of Delia supporters outside Dar Centrali stared up at the fourth floor windows in bemusement, with shouts and banging noises heard clearly from the street. 

Back from the brink

At one point, an animated Grech was asked to leave the meeting for five minutes to calm down.  

Zammit Dimech again urged both sides to come together to reach a compromise, with PN MP Mario de Marco also emphasising that the whole party needed to get its act together. 

Cheers erupted shortly past 1am, as both sides backed down from their brinksmanship and the compromise text was unanimously agreed upon by the executive. 

Most members filtered out of the six-hour standoff without comment soon after. 
The general council will vote on August 1 on whether the party members should be invited to confirm Delia as party leader or hold a leadership election. 

Delia told journalists in a short address outside the party headquarters that he would contest a leadership election if that is the option chosen by the general council.