11 mayors who were representing the Labour Party in their respective local councils will not be recontesting their seats in the upcoming June elections.
Meanwhile, one Nationalist Party mayor will also not be recontesting her seat in her locality, another PN mayor has defected to the PL, while two mayors – one from Gozo, one from Malta – will be contesting the upcoming elections as independent candidates.
Out of the 11 PL mayors not recontesting the local council elections, two of them are not on their locality’s ballot sheet because they are contesting the European Parliament elections instead. Gudja mayor Marija Sara Vella Gafa and Mtarfa mayor Daniel Attard are the duo campaigning to win seats in Brussels, and therefore not recontesting on their respective localities.
The remaining 9 PL mayors who are not recontesting are Joanne Debono Grech (Birkirkara), Pierre Dalli (Fgura), Darren Abela (Ghaxaq), Terence Agius (Kirkop), Dean Hili (Pembroke), Zoya Attard (Pieta), Hubert Saliba (Xewkija), Mark Camilleri (Zebbug, Malta), and Doris Abela (Zejtun).
Fgura mayor Pierre Dalli had been in the post since 2017, when he succeeded now Home Affairs Minister Byron Camilleri as he was elected to Parliament, and had been a local councillor since 2009.
Doris Abela had also been Zejtun mayor since 2017, when she succeeded Joe Attard who passed away, and was elected into the post again in 2019. Darren Abela will not recontest the post of Ghaxaq mayor, which he had held since 2013.
Terence Agius meanwhile became Malta’s youngest ever mayor in 2015 when he was elected to lead the Kirkop local council at the age of just 18 – beating the record set by Ian Borg who was elected as Dingli mayor at the age of 19 in 2005. Borg is now Foreign Affairs Minister, but it doesn’t appear that Agius will – at least for now – be following his political progression.
The PL are still guaranteed a local council majority in all of these localities as the PN have not fielded enough candidates to make up a majority, so the focus of interest will shift towards who would succeed these politicians in the mayoral seat.
The Deputy Mayors in all of these localities are re-contesting the elections, and interestingly in Fgura former mayor Darren Marmara who held the post between 2009 and 2013 is also back on the ballot sheet for the first time since then.
Pembroke’s Dean Hili meanwhile had been mayor since 2013, but said on Facebook that he had taken the difficult decision to not contest the election and that having now become a father his priorities had somewhat changed.
However he also said that “if we want to encourage the same candidates of this year to recontest in five years, let’s protect them.”
“They are going to find a sea of waves before them for which they need to have thick skin and be capable of standing up to. But there are other waves which are easily surmountable if everybody does their duty,” he said.
“Expecting the mayor to be a policeman with contractors who work in the neighbourhood, a policeman with the Building and Construction Authority, a policeman of the wardens, and a policeman of the police themselves, needs to stop as soon as possible,” Hili, who is a lawyer by profession, said.
“Let’s leave our mayors free to work on projects, on local policies, and how they want to see the village develop,” he added.
Interestingly, the PL’s St Julian’s minority leader Adrian Dominic Ellul is now contesting on the Pembroke ticket – an established candidate from another locality perhaps hoping to pick up Hili’s votes.
Joanne Debono Grech, who is the daughter of former PL minister and stalwart Joe Debono Grech, had served in the Birkirkara local council since its establishment and was the locality’s mayor for the last 11 years.
She hands over the baton come June: “Even though these last years were difficult times when it comes to my health, I have always continued working and doing my best to see that Birkirkara gets what it deserves. Today the time has come for people with more energy, and who have the same love that I have for Birkirkara and the Karkarizi, to enter the council,” she wrote when nominations had closed.
Her daughter, Yana Borg Debono Grech, will be contesting the local council elections for the first time instead.
Mark Camilleri, who succeeded Malcolm Paul Agius Galea as mayor of Zebbug (Malta) after the popular doctor was elected to Parliament in 2022, will also not contest for a seat.
He wrote on his Facebook page that not contesting was a hard decision that he had taken with his wife, who has since passed away, and said that he had stuck to her wishes. He said he was proud of all that the council had achieved in the past five years and said that he had always given space for all councillors who wanted to work to do so, but expressed regret at some who had interfered with the council’s work “to the detriment of the people who gave them their faith and in the worst period of my life with no remorse before sickness and death.”
Other localities where the PL aren’t guaranteed a majority and where their mayor will not be contesting are in Pieta, where Zoya Attard – who was promoted to mayor after Keith Azzopardi Tanti was elected as an MP in 2022 – will not stand for election, and in Xewkija, where Hubert Saliba – an aide to Gozo Minister Clint Camilleri – will not be recontesting.
Outspoken Gzira mayor Conrad Borg Manche will be recontesting in his locality, but as an independent candidate after he fell out with the Labour Party during his tenure as mayor.
There have been other allegiance changes: Ghasri mayor Daniel Attard (not to be confused with the Daniel Attard contesting the MEP elections) has switched allegiances from the PN to the PL, under whose ticket his name will be in the 2024 local council elections.
Fontana mayor Saviour Borg meanwhile will now be contesting as an independent candidate, having served as mayor representing the Nationalist Party.
The PN themselves will only have one mayor who is not recontesting outright, and that is Naxxar mayor Anne Marie Muscat Fenech Adami.
Muscat Fenech Adami said that she would be taking a step back from politics to focus on her family and spend more time with her grandchildren, having been on the local council since 2009.
“I understand that my decision not to contest may come as a surprise to many, given my longstanding commitment to the community. However, I hope it’s seen as a natural progression in life, where family priorities take precedence. I will always cherish the memories and experiences I’ve had while serving Naxxar,” she told the Times of Malta last month.
Muscat Fenech Adami was thrust into the spotlight in 2021 when the PN tried to pressure her into resigning for ignoring party orders to vote against a huge residential complex on the former Naxxar trade fair grounds car park and for failing to declare a conflict of interest in the proposed development.
An ethics probe into the matter was never published, and Muscat Fenech Adami never stepped down.
