Updated 10.30 am

Former Minister Charles Mangion has been elected in the casual election to fill the seat in parliament vacated by Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca when she resigned to become President.

He won 2,201 votes when the quota was 1,959. His closest rival was Gavin Gulia with 1,066 votes.

Dr Mangion is congratulated at the counting hall.

The election, on the sixth district, was also contested by Manuel Micallef and Simon Saliba.

Dr Mangion, a former justice minister and now chairman of Enemalta, had been in pole position, having inherited 352 votes from Ms Coleiro-Preca last year.

By the time the sorting of votes was completed this morning, Dr Mangion's packet of votes was clearly bigger than that of his nearest rival, Dr Gulia.

The casual election started at 9am at the counting centre in Naxxar.

Dr Mangion was  first elected to Parliament in 1987 and continued to be elected until last year.

He was shadow minister for home affairs between 1992 and 1994 and shadow minister for industry and local government from 1994 to 1996. During this period he was also Deputy Speaker of Parliament..

Following the election of the Sant government, he was justice minister from 1996 to 1998 but resigned after taking responsibility when a prisoner convicted of drug charges was released two weeks early following a presidential pardon. He subsequently negotiated the lease of the land for the Midi project on behalf of the government.

In May 2003 he was elected deputy leader of the Labour Party, responsible for parliamentary affairs. 

When Dr Sant resigned as Leader of the Opposition in 2008, Dr Mangion served as Opposition leader until Joseph Muscat took over.