Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1058684
maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 5 DECEMBER 2018 7 NEWS ANALYSIS handicapped by the ability of both parties to present MEP candidates who may be palat- able to this segment of voters. Moreover, the trend over past elections bar one, has been for voters to move from one tradi- tional party to the other. Although no government is at stake in MEP elections and people are free to vote for third parties without fear of helping the party they dislike most to win power, voters have remained loyal to the major parties in the two most recent MEP elections. So far there has been one his- toric exception to this trend; Arnold Cassola's near miss in the first MEP elections held in 2004 where nearly one tenth of voters opted for the Green Party candidate. On that occasion Cassola capitalised on the goodwill he gained among pale blue voters during the EU referendum and on the first signs of the disag- gregation of the PN's coalition of voters. Yet while in 2004 AD managed to tap into the disgruntlement against the party in government because the Opposition was still perceived in a bad light, so far there have been little signs of any significant number of PL voters looking for new pastures in 2019 and the PD may end up competing for votes within the restricted cohort of 2017 PN voters. Floaters who shifted to Labour in 2013 and 2017 may be an ide- al catchment area for third par- ties like the PD but this depends on their level of dissatisfaction with the government. However, surveys so far have suggested that apart from those who switched to the Forza Naz- zjonali before 2017 this cohort which also includes PN voters who first voted Labour in 2017, has largely remained loyal to Muscat's Labour. By outsmarting the PN and presenting its own motion of censure in Konrad Mizzi the Democratic Party has taken the centrestage, putting Delia in the uncomfortable position of having to ditch this motion not to play second fiddle to what was Simon Busuttil's junior coalition partner PD leader Godfrey Farrugia comes across as calm, moderate and measured