St Paul’s Bay, Sliema and St Julian’s with highest rate of uncollected votes

St Paul's Bay, Sliema and St Julian's top the list of the localities with the highest amounts of uncollected votes.

As 35 localities prepare to go to the polls tomorrow, this year's uncollected votes have reached a staggering amount of 33,000. This figure highly contrasts with the 2007's 7,000 uncollected votes.

The top four localities in uncollected votes are PN strongholds St Paul's Bay, Sliema, St Julian's and Swieqi.

Out of the 16,632 registered voters in St Paul's Bay, 7,328 did not collect their votes. In Sliema, 5,160 remained uncollected out of 14,798 voting document,

2,155 out of 7,999 votes were not collected in Swieqi.

The large number of votes collected in Mosta - 13,963 out of 15,656 registered voters - may indicate that the PN's campaign which mainly focused on the locality might have mobilised the party's faithful.

According to the electoral commission, between 16,000 and 17,000 from the 33,000 uncollected votes belong to EU citizens residing in Malta.

However, the high rate of uncollected votes could also reflect a number of disgruntled residents. The local council elections are normally characterised by a higher than average abstention because of a number of reasons, including disinterest in local elections and traditional PN voters who choose to send a message to the administration by not voting.

In the last few years, the only two local council elections that had a higher voting turnout were the 2003 and 2008 elections.

While the 2007 local council elections had a participation rate of 68%, 86% had participated in the 2008 local elections as they took place on the same day of the general elections.

In 2003, the local elections were held on the same day of the EU referendum.