Gozo PN councillor Kevin Cutajar in bid for co-option to House
Xaghra councillor Kevin Cutajar announces bid to occupt PN seat vacated by David Stellini
Lawyer Kevin Cutajar has formally announced his bid to occupy the Nationalist Party seat vacated by David Stellini, potentially setting the stage for a further rift within the party.
In a Facebook post, Cutajar, a Xagħra councillor, said he will be attending the Nationalist executive committee meeting on Saturday to formally request his co-option to parliament.
"Now that the election is over... I will be seeking to take David Stellini's seat, which was earlier occupied by Marthese Portelli, so as to respect the Gozitan voters' wish," he wrote. "I'm sure the PN executive will respect Gozitan voters because the PN is Gozo's party."
Cutajar was a PN candidate for the 2017 and 2013 general elections, as well as local councillor in Xagħra since 2007, re-elected in the 2019 election.
Various Nationalist MPs have called for the co-option of Gozitan local councillor Kevin Cutajar to the House of Representatives, in the wake of David Stellini’s resignation.
The push for Cutajar presents the PN parliamentary group with a compelling argument to have a Gozitan take up the seat of Gozitan MP David Stellini, and in that way, also scupper the chances of seeing PN leader Adrian Delia push to have Jean Pierre Debono, the former MP who gave up his seat for Delia’s co-option in 2017, back in the House.
The Nationalist MP David Stellini officially resigned his seat in the House of Representatives, to return to his posting with the European People’s Party in Brussels.
In an interview with MaltaToday, the Gozitan MP, who ran for MEP, expressed his dismay at the excessive partisanship of Maltese politics.
“I came from Brussels to Malta in a bid to work for a politics of unity, that can give people results. But there is a group of people who want the politics of the arena... a battle between gladiators,” he said.
“I call it the politics of symbiosis, because the large gladiator needs to have a smaller gladiator to fight against, and the smaller gladiator needs to pick a fight with the large opponent to keep its fans alive: the PN must be careful not to fall into this battle because it will not win it,” Stellini said. “The Maltese system is not conducive to the politics of unity I embrace.”