Malta’s two largest parties have a “healthy” number of candidates to contest the local council elections, according to senior Labour and Nationalist sources.

As Malta prepares for its local elections on June 8 – on the same day as the European Parliament elections – Nationalist Party general secretary Michael Piccinino and Local Government Parliamentary Secretary Alison Zerafa Civelli both said their parties have a good number of candidates to field. 

“So far, we have around the same number of candidates as we did in 2019, and some still need to be approved in the coming weeks,” Piccinino said. “We expect to have more candidates than we had five years ago,” he said.

In 2019, the PN had 299 candidates while the Labour Party had 398.

Piccinino said local councils have an important role to play in representing the interests of residents.

A Labour Party spokesperson told Times of Malta that the PL already had over 300 local election candidates.

In December, Times of Malta reported that the main political parties were struggling to recruit candidates for the next local elections, and many youngsters were showing no interest in contesting.

However, the mood has appeared to swing with Zerafa Civelli saying there is enthusiasm for the June 8 local elections.

Asked if there will be enough candidates for competitive elections to be held, she said: “The numbers we have as a party indicate that yes, there will be a good number of candidates on behalf of the Labour Party.”

The Electoral Commission will close its applications for local council candidates on April 29.

Sources confirmed that most localities have enough candidates for an election but added that some localities, such as Żebbuġ, still do not have enough candidates to fill the number of seats on the council. Should this be the case, then an election cannot be held.