PN's Swieqi campaign event cancelled due to rain

The Nationalist Party cancelled its campaign event in Swieqi on Friday evening after rain began to fall minutes into the gathering.

A party spokesperson confirmed the cancellation was due to weather conditions.

The theme of the event tonight was on security.

A party spokesperson confirmed the cancellation was due to weather conditions.

Before the event was called off, Opposition Leader Alex Borg told those gathered that Swieqi would be a priority for a PN government, pointing to the locality's shift from a residential area to an increasingly commercial one and the need to address the security challenges that came with it.

He said the local council had long been asking for a stronger police presence and that a PN government would restore power to local councils to allow them to better address realities on the ground.

The remarks came a day after Borg, alongside Home Affairs spokesperson Darren Carabott, had unveiled a package of security and immigration proposals at a press conference on Thursday.

Among these was a pledge to overhaul Malta's residency and work permit system through a streamlined one-stop shop model, with separate counters for Maltese and EU citizens on one hand, and employers and third-country nationals on the other.

Borg also proposed a joint taskforce between the Armed Forces and the police to tackle illegal immigration, drug trafficking and organised crime, including specialised operations against human trafficking and the repatriation of people living in Malta illegally and foreign criminals.

Other measures included mandatory basic Maltese language courses for third-country nationals in public-facing jobs within a year of arriving, increased investment in police and Armed Forces infrastructure in Gozo, and reforms to the Immigration Appeals Board to make it more independent under the leadership of a magistrate.