Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/849592
Newspaper post SUNDAY • 16 JULY 2017 • ISSUE 923 • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY SUNDAY • 16 JULY 2017 • ISSUE 923 • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY maltatoday YOUR FIRST READ AND FIRST CLICK OF THE DAY WWW.MALTATODAY.COM.MT SUNDAY • 16 JULY 2017 • ISSUE 923 • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY today today • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY today • PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SUNDAY INTERVIEW JIM WIGHTMAN on Malta's uphill struggle on cycling PN LEADERSHIP Complaints made over councillors' eligibility 14 15 Malta should be as ideal for cycling but our rate of bicycle-usage remains among the lowest in Europe Labour delegates elect health minister Chris Fearne as new deputy leader for parliamentary affairs and deputy Prime Minister with 51% of the vote• PAGE 3 THE Nationalist Party's electoral commission has re- ceived complaints from at least two PN committees, over irregular nominations of councillors to the Gen- eral Council that will select the two leadership candi- dates for election by the party membership. The commission, headed by former EU commis- sioner Joe Borg, received complaints from the Sliema and Attard committees, party sources told MaltaTo- day, specifically over the number of individuals eligi- ble for the General Council vote. Every party club gets to send one councillor to the General Council for each 350 votes garnered in the last election for the PN. Preference goes to the com- mittee members, but additional councillors must be agreed upon by the committee. Large PN-majority localities like Birkirkara, for ex- ample, get to send some 50 councillors to the General Council. MaltaToday was told by two MPs that councillors' lists for their home-towns included nominations who did not even hail from that same locality. For exam- ple, in one case Gozitan councillor had been nomi- nated for the General Council to represent Maltese committees. "The problem lies in the fact that the list of council- lors was presented to the commission just days after the general election, and justifiably, MPs and party club committees are annoyed that there has been no form of verification," one MP said. Another MP who confirmed the complaints said the lack of verification raised the suspicion that the councillors' list had been skewed in favour of certain candidates. So far, three candidates appear to be in the running for the PN leadership, namely lawyer Adrian Delia, who is not an MP, the Gozitan MP and former minis- ter Chris Said, as well as outgoing PN treasurer Alex Perici Calascione. Nationalist MP Claudio Grech, also touted for the post, would not confirm his can- didature when asked yesterday by MaltaToday, simply saying that he was keeping his options open. Nominations for the leadership open tomorrow and close on 19 July, with an election set for 16 Septem- ber, in time for the party's annual Independence Day celebrations. The electoral commission, presided by Joe Borg, includes Matthew Mangion and Boris Xerri from the PN's electoral office Elcom, outgoing interna- tional secretary Trevor Degiorgio, PN women's sec- tion president Marion Pace Asciak, former assistant secretary general Angelito Sciberras, and MediaLink director Isabel Vella. €1.75 four decades of CHANGE 10 11 How Malta changed: the gay rights revolution in one of the world's most Catholic societies PL DEPUTY LEADERSHIP It's Chris Fearne 388 illegalities sanctioned during electoral campaign JAMES DEBONO A MaltaToday probe reveals a spike in the num- ber of minor illegalities regularised by the Plan- ning Authority in the election period and the two subsequent weeks. The permits were issued through a regularisa- tion scheme through which owners pay a fine to have their properties fully regularised, so that they can become available for sale. 388 regularisation permits were granted in the five weeks between 10 May and 6 June. 209 granted permits were also listed on the gov- ernment gazettes in the subsequent two weeks. But the number of permits dropped to just 52 in the first two weeks of July. 3