Gozo mayor facing breathalyzer arraignment suspends himself from PN

The Nationalist Party’s mayor of Victoria, Gozo, Samuel Azzopardi, has resigned his office in a letter he sent to party secretary-general Rosette Thake.

Azzopardi is expected to be arraigned over his involvement in a traffic accident in Gozo last Sunday, during which he refused to take a breathalyzer test. He denies having cause the accident, and claims to have been “under shock and did not understand the ramifications of not taking the [breathalyzer] test”.

Azzopardi will retain his seat on the Victoria council as an independent councillor.

“I feel I have to suspend myself from the PN… as a public person I am subjected to more scrutiny than a private person,” Azzopardi said in a letter to Thake.

Thake said that she had accepted Azzopardi’s ‘politically correct’ action, who asked to be suspended from the party pending the court proceedings. “Azzopardi is giving an example to anyone who occupies a political role,” Thake said.