Find out which women candidates will become MPs through the gender mechanism

Malta’s parliament will grow by an additional 12 seats at the end of the electoral process when the gender corrective mechanism kicks in.

The mechanism is intended to boost the number of women MPs and will be used for the first time in the 2022 election.

However, the gender mechanism will only kick in after casual elections take place on districts where seats are vacated by MPs elected on two constituencies.

The mechanism will require 12 extra seats – six to each party – to be awarded to unelected women if the share of women MPs is less than 40%.

The first to be elected by the mechanism will be those women left standing at the last count. The next step would be to draw up a rank order of women candidates based on their last count vote before they were eliminated and calculated as a percentage of the district quota.

The remaining extra seats would be filled depending on this rank order.

MaltaToday has drawn up a rank order for each of the two parties based on the official results published by the Electoral Commission.

Labour Party

Left standing: Rosianne Cutajar (6th District)

The former MP could still be elected by casual election and thus will not need the gender mechanism to get her seat in parliament. However, if she fails to get elected in the casual election, Cutajar will be the first to benefit from the mechanism since she was left standing at the last count with 2,919 votes.

Rank order:

The remaining seats will be filled by the top five scoring candidates when their last vote before elimination is calculated as a percentage of the district quota. If Rosianne Cutajar or any other female candidate is elected in casual elections, the commission will go down the list until all six extra seats are awarded. A number of these candidates could still get elected in casual elections that may take place on their districts.

1. Alicia Bugeja Said (3rd District) – 55% of district quota on last count

2. Rebecca Buttigieg (9th District) – 47%

3. Cressida Galea (1st District) – 43%

4. Katya De Giovanni (4th District) – 35%

5. Abigail Camilleri (13th District) – 33%

6. Romilda Baldacchino Zarb (11th District) – 29%

7. Amanda Spiteri Grech (4th District) – 23%

8. Naomi Cachia (7th District) – 19%

9. Davina Sammut Hili (1st District) – 13%

10. Fiona Borg (6th District) – 6%

11. Audrey Demicoli (3rd District) – 3%

12. Fleur Vella (7th District) – 1%

Nationalist Party

Left standing: Janice Chetcuti (3rd District)

Chetcuti could still be elected by casual election and thus will not need the gender mechanism to get her seat in parliament. However, if she fails to get elected in the casual election, Chetcuti will be the first to benefit from the mechanism since she was left standing at the last count with 2,867 votes.

Rank order:

The remaining seats will be filled by the top five scoring candidates when their last vote before elimination is calculated as a percentage of the district quota. If Janice Chetcuti or any other female candidate is elected in casual elections, the commission will go down the list until all six extra seats are awarded. A number of these candidates could still get elected in casual elections that may take place on their districts.

1. Paula Mifsud Bonnici (1st District) – 67% of district quota on last count

2. Julie Zahra (8th District) – 63%

3. Bernice Bonello (2nd District) – 57%

4. Rebekah Cilia (7th District) – 53%

5. Claudette Buttigieg (12th District) – 45%

6. Eve Borg Bonello (9th District) – 37%

7. Emma Portelli Bonnici (10th District) – 32%

8. Maria Deguara (12th District) – 27%

9. Alessia Psaila Zammit (6th District) – 26%

10. Graziella Attard Previ (10th District) – 18%

11. Mary Muscat (3rd District) – 17%

12. Francine Farrugia (5th District) – 16%

13. Josephine Xuereb (13th District) – 13%

14. Doris Borg (2nd District) – 7%

15. Josianne Cardona Gatt (1st District) – 2%