Why not a fixed election date

General elections in Malta have to be held every five years but there is no fixed date and the prime minister retains sole prerogative to call it whenever he deems fit. 

In 2017, Joseph Muscat called the general election a full year before the five-year term was up. Indeed, Muscat’s first administration stretched over 1,514 days from election date to parliament’s dissolution, making it the shortest since the 1996 Alfred Sant government that was truncated after 22 months when it lost a vote of no confidence. 

This situation inevitably leads to election date speculation once the administration’s term enters its third year—past the halfway mark. And the situation today is no different from every other administration before it. 

Abela’s administration will clock four years in office in March and since last summer, we’ve been hearing from people who gravitate close to the corridors of power about an impending election. It was fuelled by Abela himself just before the summer when he said that if the Nationalist Party leadership election leads to instability, he would call an election. The rumour mill had suggested election dates in June 2025, then October 2025 and even November. All the speculation fell flat on its face and in an interview he gave Times of Malta in December, Abela shut down the early election rumours—the body language suggested that he did not want the uncertainty to impact the Christmas mood and retail. 

In his exchange with the MaltaToday newsroom last week, Abela ruled out an early election. He said his focus is on October 2026, when the government will deliver its final budget of the legislature. But he did introduce a caveat—the decision when to call a general election will also depend on international developments. 

Given the global uncertainty created by an unpredictable Donald Trump, it would seem that Malta’s election date is in the hands of the US president. 

If Abela’s words were intended to quell the speculation, they failed. The rumour-mill’s expectation of a general election shifted from March 2026 to June 2026. 

The truth is that the people around the corridors of power who are making these assertions are most probably making educated guesses based on their interpretation of certain decisions, or lack of, taken by the country’s and PL’s top brass. 

One such announcement came last week when the Labour Party issued a call for prospective general election candidates. The truth is that such a call would be perfectly normal, some 18 months before the general election is due because it helps the party vet candidates, also giving them time to get the ball rolling if selected. 

But the speculation may also have a political motive of keeping ministers, MPs and prospective candidates on tenterhooks, encouraging them to work harder, meet more people and address grievances. 

This speculation may make for interesting dinner or wedding conversations. It may provoke analytical news features that try to interpret and explain government decisions. But there is also the downside. Speculation breeds uncertainty and this can negatively impact business sentiment, especially in a context where a change in government is a possibility. 

Prime ministers have successively argued that their sole yardstick in choosing the election date was the national interest. We’re not so convinced the national interest was the sole motivating force. Partisan interest would have also played a role to give the party in government the maximum advantage. 

Within this context, this leader believes that the country should seriously consider adopting a system whereby the general election is held on a fixed day. In this way, everyone will know when the next election is coming, sweeping away any speculation that causes uncertainty. 

The only exceptions for an early election would be if the government loses a vote of confidence in parliament or if the prime minister believes it is in the national interest to hold an early election, which, however will have to be approved by a majority vote in parliament following the presentation of a motion. The latter will give leeway for an election to be held earlier but it removes the surprise element from the decision. 

A fixed election date makes it possible to introduce laws that curb a government’s power of incumbency in the run-up to the election. In this way, the rushed decisions on the eve of an election to appease and accommodate voter requests—some of which are undeserving—can be eliminated. 

But a fixed date also makes sense to better regulate spending by candidates and political parties before the election campaign actually kicks off. 

We believe that a fixed election date has more advantages than the current scenario but until that time comes, if at all, we will continue speculating on the election date and the reasons—real or imagined—underpinning the rumoured choice.