The 2022 General Election - Malta

On 20th February 2022, Maltese Prime Minister Robert Abela asked the President of the Republic to dissolve parliament, so that a general election can be held on 26th March. I aim to continously update this post throughout the campaign period with several visualisations on the political parties or candidates contesting.

Background

The 2022 election will see the largest number of political parties contesting a general election in Malta since the one in 1955 when the Christian Workers Party, the Progressive Constitutionalist Party, the Democratic Nationalist Party, and the Democratic Christian Party joined the Partit Nazzjonalista, the Malta Labour Party and two independent candidates.

In 2022, apart from the Partit Nazzjonalista and the Partit Laburista, citizens can vote for the right-wing ABBA and Partit Popolari, the centre-left ADPD and Volt Malta and four independents. Moviment Patrijotti Maltin is still registered with the Electoral Commission but it seems that most of its members have switched to Partit Popolari and the party will not be contesting the 2022 election. Imperium Europa, although registered with the Electoral Commission, has only contested one General Election throughout its existance, and does not seem to be fielding candidates for 2022.

Political Parties

Facebook following

For the past months I have been tracking the Facebook following of political parties registered with the Electoral Commission. Some parties, like Imperium Europa, do not seem to have an official Facebook page, while others, like Għarb First, are local political parties and therefore not part of this visualisation.

Polls

Local newspaper Maltatoday provided daily updated polls throughout the election campaign, which I believe is a first for Malta.

Result

Partit Laburista won the 2022 General Election by a landslide, winning 55.11% of the total votes cast. 41.74% of the votes went to Partit Nazzjonalista, 1.61% to ADPD, 0.52% to Partit Popolari, 0.46% to ABBA, 0.43% to independent candidates, and 0.13% to Volt Malta.

Previously published posts related to elections in Malta:

Maltese Political Parties' Share of Parliamentary Seats, 1921-2017

First count votes in Parliamentary Elections in Malta - 1921-2017

How does a casual election work?

I use Flourish Studio to create the visualisations.