A court had dismissed claims by the Labour Party that it suffered a breach of human rights when a Constitutional Court annulled a previous court’s decision to allocate extra parliamentary seats to the PN.

The judgement was delivered this afternoon by Mr Justice JR Micallef.

The case revolves around a mistake in the counting of votes in the general election on the eighth district when a packet of 50 votes belonging to PN candidate Claudette Buttigieg was mistakenly transferred to PN candidate Michael Asciak.

Dr Asciak was eliminated and Labour’s Edward Scicluna was elected.

On the 13th district, 10 votes belonging to PN candidate Frederick Azzopardi went missing and Labour’s Justyne Caruana was elected.

The PN instituted court proceedings against the Electoral Commission and the Attorney General, claiming the mistakes affected the outcome of the election result and requesting to be awarded the two seats.

The First Hall had  ordered the Electoral Commission to award two additional seats in parliament to the PN.

At the end of May the Constitutional Court annulled that decision, upholding Labour’s argument that it should have been included in the case. The case went back to the First Hall.

Then the PL filed its new claim objecting to that part of the Constitutional Court’s decision finding that the First Hall has jurisdiction over the case. The PL said the Constitutional Court deprived it of making its arguments on that point, in breach of its right to a fair hearing, and called on the First Hall to provide a remedy.

That case was dismissed today.