Miriam Dalli, Clyde Caruana to be co-opted to Parliament

Miriam Dalli and Clyde Caruana will be coopted to Parliament by the Labour Party, in replacement of Joseph Muscat and Etienne Grech, both of whom resigned this month in different circumstances.

The co-option ends a week of speculation as to who would replace the former Prime Minister after the only two candidates, Stefan Buontempo and Mark Causon, did not apply to take part in a casual election to fill the vacated seat. In Grech's case, a co-option was necessary as he had been elected in a casual election.

The PL said that Prime Minister Robert Abela, on Saturday, summoned a meeting of the PL’s Parliamentary Group as well as the party’s Executive to discuss the co-options. Both were approved unanimously and the process has been started for their co-option.

Miriam Dalli will need to resign from the European Parliament, and a casual election needs to be held to replace her.

Caruana has served as head of secretariat in the Office of the Prime Minister, an appointment he took after Abela became Prime Minister.

The co-option of both serves to strengthen the Labour side of the House of Representatives with a popular candidate - Dalli had obtained the highest number of votes in the 2019 MEP elections - and an economist (Caruana), who is likely to be a replacement for Edward Scicluna as Finance Minister in the future.

The co-option could also give Abela the chance for a mini-reshuffle, given that it is highly unlikely that Dalli chose to leave a lucrative post in Brussels to sit on the back bench.

Dalli is the vice-president of the S&D group, a post she will have to relinquish. She had won the honour of the best Member of the European Parliament in energy and health.

Caruana is a graduate in economics and a University lecturer. He had also served as executive chairman of Jobsplus.

In a post on Facebook, Dalli said she received hundreds of messages over the past week, including from the media and colleagues in Brussels, but she could not reply to them.

She confirmed that she will be moving to the Maltese Parliament and promised to work in the best interests of the country.