The electoral campaign comes to an end at midnight today for a "day of reflection" tomorrow before the country goes to the polls on Saturday.

The campaign, officially launched with the announcement of Election Day by Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi on February 4, proceeded at a slow and somewhat calm pace at first but heated up as accusations flew in all directions over recent days.

The political activities culminate today with a debate between Dr Gonzi and Labour leader Alfred Sant on TVM at 8.30 p.m.

Both the Nationalist and Labour parties will hold their final mass meetings of the campaign - the PN at the Granaries in Floriana at 6 p.m. and the MLP at the Luxol Grounds in Pembroke at 5 p.m.

Trivia

• In October there were 315,357 registered voters.

• Of these, 993 were withheld because of death and other reasons.

• 285,205 voting documents were distributed to households by the police.

• 29,159 were undelivered but 20,144 of these were later collected from the police stations by Sunday at noon.

• 9,015 voting documents were returned to Electoral Commission and, until last night, less than 6,300 remained unclaimed.

• A total of 600 telephones lines have been put up in the Naxxar counting hall.

• No power cut will disrupt the work at the counting hall as the commission has about 12 generators at hand, should the need arise.

• When the distribution of first preference votes begins after 10.30 a.m. on Sunday, there are expected to be about 1,300 people in front and behind the Perspex in the counting hall.

• There are 3,980 assistant electoral commissioners and 598 counting staff on hand, with 402 supervisors and 42 calculators.

• About 5,000 people are expected to pass through the counting hall between Sunday and Tuesday, when the counting will come to an end.