There are no plans to suspend the campaign to raise awareness of the recently acquired right of 16-year-olds to vote in local council elections, despite a government proposal that would keep this age group from casting their ballots until 2019.

Launched with pomp last year, the campaign seeks to promote what the government described as a historic milestone, through a number of public events and the participation of “youth ambassadors” representing councils.

However, questions about whether there is still need for the campaign right now have been raised in the wake of government plans to postpone all council elections and hold them in 2019, on the same day as the elections for the European Parliament.

The arguments made in favour of this move range from saving costs to addressing election fatigue and improve turnout.

The idea was first floated a few days after the enactment of a law, supported by all political parties, under which the voting age in local council elections will go down to 16 from 18 starting from the poll scheduled for next year.

But if the elections are postponed, the current crop of 16-year-olds will already be 21 by the time they vote in 2019.

This would render pointless the Vote 16 Campaign targeting these very voters, at least for the time being.

Speculation that the proposal had dealt a fatal blow to the campaign was further fuelled by the fact that a Vote 16 seminar, which was supposed to have been held on July 5, was cancelled.

Replying to a parliamentary question filed by Opposition MP Robert Cutajar, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici, who is also responsible for local government, attributed the decision to cancel the seminar to “logistical problems”, but no future date has yet been set.

Replying to questions from Times of Malta, Vote 16 committee chairman Michael Cohen clarified that the committee had not been disbanded but the campaign had been put on the back burner due to the reform of local wardens, in view of his commitments as government consultant on local councils.

“The committee will continue to work normally and is set to meet in about a fortnight,” Mr Cohen said.

Asked whether it made sense to forge ahead with the campaign given the current circumstances, he said the committee’s remit had nothing to do with elections.