Six candidates vie for Therese Comodini Cachia’s EP seat

Six candidates have thrown in their hat in the ring for the election of a new Member of the European Parliament, a position vacated by Therese Comodini Cachia who is today a PN MP.

The candidates are: PN MP Francis Zammit Dimech, Ray Bugeja, Helga Ellul, Jonathan Shaw, Norman Vella and Kevin Cutajar.

Former candidates Kevin Plumpton and Stefano Mallia have decided against submitting their nomination.

The casual election takes place on Tuesday, 18 July at the counting hall in Naxxar.

Zammit Dimech is considered to be the favourite to win the casual election having garnered 8,660 first preference votes. However, everything depends on how people voted on Comodini Cachia’s ballot sheet as it is her packet of 29,580 votes that will be opened and distributed amongst the candidates according to the voters’ preference.

Comodini Cachia has reluctantly vacated her seat in Brussels, having first told voters that would not relinquish her seat in Malta to stay on as MEP, claiming her mission will be “to rebuild Malta’s reputation abroad”.

The human rights lawyer was elected on eighth district with 4,244 votes on the 22nd count.
But after the controversial decision raised the ire of PN voters, Comodini Cachia said she had decided to choose Malta.