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RANGER
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posted 11 March 2008 09:02 PM      Profile for RANGER     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Malta's ruling Nationalists claim victory in hard-fought election, Labor refuses to concede

The Associated Press
Sunday, March 9, 2008
VALLETTA, Malta: Malta's long-ruling Nationalist Party said Sunday it had narrowly won a parliamentary election, sending supporters into the streets to celebrate. But the Labor Party refused to concede defeat, saying it was waiting for more official returns to come in.

"All indications show that the Nationalist Party has won the election, by 1,200 votes," Nationalist Party secretary general Joe Saliba said, citing his party's projections, to the cheers of dozens of supporters.

Officials from both parties had refused to claim victory throughout most of the day, saying Saturday's election was too close to call.

But Saliba's announcement prompted party supporters to pour into the streets of the tiny Mediterranean island, waving party flags and honking horns, local media reported.

Labor Party officials said any celebration was premature, insisting that both parties were still neck-and-neck.

Opinion polls and political analysts had predicted a race down to the wire, in keeping with the tradition of a nation that is highly polarized politically. But this was one of the tightest elections since the former British colony gained independence in 1964, observers said.

It was not clear when a final ballot count would come in.

The election saw Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi of the Nationalist Party run against Labor Party leader Alfred Sant.

"Our projections confirm that the Nationalist Party will again be the largest party in Malta," Gonzi said. "We look forward to the official results confirming the Nationalist Party as the governing party."

In the last election in 2003, the Nationalists won on a platform for EU membership, while the socialists had contended that joining the EU would crush Malta's national identity.

Now, with Malta's EU membership secured and an economy based on tourism and anchored on the euro, the election boiled down to whether Maltese wanted change after two decades of almost uninterrupted rule by the same party.

The island nation has been run by the Nationalists since 1987, except for 22 months between 1996 and 1998 when Labor was in power and Sant was the prime minister.

Gonzi, 54, said his party had done a good job modernizing this island of 400,000 people between Sicily and North Africa and deserved to continue. Sant, 60, ran on anti-corruption campaign and urged the Maltese to vote for change.

Turnout among the nation's 315,000 eligible voters stood at about 93 percent — 3 percentage points down from the 2003 election and one of the lowest in years.

At stake are 65 members of the one-chamber Parliament.

Two smaller parties, the far-right National Action and the Green Party, were also running, but an early vote count suggested they had failed to elect any of their candidates, representatives from both parties said.

In 2003, the Nationalists won 34 seats and Labor took 31.


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