PN's candidates commission and due diligence panel will not be saying whether Adrian Delia and Bernard Grech are eligible to contest the party's leadership.

In a statement on Friday, the Candidates Commission "made it clear" that neither the panel nor the commission "will be issuing any declaration as to whether the two leadership contenders have satisfied the minimum criteria to be eligible to contest".

The due diligence report will be passed on to the Administrative Council and the Electoral Commission. The latter has three days to open up the call for nominations, it added.

"The whole purpose is to provide the electoral commission and the administrative council with a résumé about the two people who have expressed an interest in this contest, which resume or extracts thereof could then be communicated to the party members," the commission added.

The PN's leadership election is likely to be held in early October amid indications that the due diligence process, examining incumbent  Delia and his challenger Grech, has still some way to run.

The election will take an entire week as voting will be spread over six days.