Said: PN can’t be allowed to become ‘Labour Mark 2’

Chris Said, one of the two remaining candidates in the Nationalist Party’s leadership race has said that like councillors, paid-up members and party activists, he too wants the PN to win the next general election but stressed that to do so, the party should not “sell its soul”.

“I was and will remain clear, even if some think that my position is not a popular one,” he said. “For the PN to win it can’t become a photocopy of Labour. Labour Mark 2 does not exist. Only a Nationalist Party built on the right principles exists.”

In a statement issued this afternoon Said said that in four years-time, the country will have had a government which has completely eroded the country’s institutions, which will be “drowning“ in corruption, and which will not have established “one economic sector, other than government jobs that are not needed”.

“Faced with this situation, the electorate will want an alternative, and if the PN becomes a photocopy, or worse still, be in bed with Labour, the electorate will have no choice but to stick with Labour,” he said.

Said, who obtained the second highest number of votes in yesterday’s election - picking up 425 votes, to Adrian Delia’s 616 - said he would be immediately be starting his campaign ahead of the second round of elections which will take place on the 16 September.

Said stressed that despite councillors choosing himself and Adrian Delia to progress to the next round, those who voted for both Alex Perici Calascione and Frank Portellli couldn’t be ignored. “I want to represent them as well,” he added.

The Gozitan MP insisted that he felt obliged to give the party’s 20,000 members a choice in the next election.

“There are thousands of paid members that do not express themselves in favour of any candidate, but who love our party and wish it well. This they do in silence in their homes,” he said.

His campaign, said Said, would be based the “clear principles” of integrity, hard work and that which was right.

Finally, Said said that he had the utmost respect and loyalty towards the party’s members and that yesterday’s result, and the support he had received, had served to increase his enthusiasm and determination to give members a choice come the 16 September.