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The reds and greens go for the vote

By Kurt Sansone

The local elections may still be five weeks away but campaigning has started in earnest with the Labour Party yesterday presenting its 110 candidates in a full-blown televised press conference and Alternattiva Demokratika hitting the streets in Mellieha to raise awareness on environmental issues affecting the locality.

Addressing a press conference held at the Hamrun headquarters, Labour leader Alfred Sant flanked by the MLP’s highest officials, explained that the Labour party would be campaigning on local issues rather than national ones.
The Labour party is presenting 23 women candidates and 87 men. The vast majority of candidates, 91, will contest elections in Malta while 19 candidates will contest the local elections in Gozo. This year the MLP is presenting 26 more candidates than it did for the elections in the same localities three years ago.

Dr Sant said that over the last three years councils with a Labour majority had achieved 90 per cent of what was promised in the 1999 local council manifestos.

Dr Sant reiterated the Labour party’s pledge, not to introduce taxes or fiscal measures at a local level. He added that Labour party councillors would work to improve the environment and encourage youth participation. Another mainstay of Labour’s manifesto is to ensure public Internet access.

Dr Sant said that according to previous trends Labour party supporters were less inclined to vote in local elections and this posed an added challenge to the party.

Meanwhile, at a press conference held in Mellieha, Green Party Chairperson Harry Vassallo, accompanied by other AD officials and Mellieha candidate Dion Borg, said that AD councillors would translate the growing public environmental conscience into political action.

AD candidate Dion Borg highlighted the main problems affecting the locality and called for a proper drainage system in Ghadira and stricter controls on the fish farms found along the Mellieha coastline. He added that rule of law should be restored at Armier and government land returned back to the
public.