Former Labour Party deputy leader Toni Abela will be made a judge on Monday, the government has confirmed.
He will be joined in the judiciary by Grazio Mercieca, a 59-year-old former Gozo Ministry consultant who left the civil service to become a court attorney last year, and who will on Monday become a magistrate.
In a statement, the government said Cabinet had approved the nominations and that the two men were expected to take their oath of office on Monday.
Dr Abela applied to join the judiciary after his application to join the European Court of Auditors was rejected by a European Parliament committee.
A practicing lawyer for more than 30 years, Dr Abela was also a member of the Employment Tribunal between 1996 and 1998, as well as a founding member of Alternattiva Demokratika.
Dr Mercieca graduated as a lawyer in 1982 and worked in the private sector for the following 33 years. He has served as Justice Commissioner, Small Claims Tribunal adjudicator and an arbiter specialising in traffic accidents, and lectures at the University of Malta.
Six weeks ago, The Sunday Times of Malta had revealed that Dr Abela and Dr Mercieca were the first to apply to become judges under a new appointment system recently passed by Parliament.
The new appointment system introduces an evaluation process for candidates seeking to join the judiciary, with applicants scrutinised by a judicial appointments committee.
Applicants must satisfy 10 criteria for the committee to approve their nominations. Criteria range from the requirement of a warrant to practise law to being proficient in Malta's two official languages and not being involved in any commercial activity that could arouse suspicion.
Both Dr Abela and Dr Mercieca passed the committee evaluation stage, the government statement said.
But while Justice Minister Owen Bonnici has trumpeted the changes - which were unanimously approved by MPs from both sides of the House - as "historic", the Dean of the Faculty of Laws at the University of Malta has expressed far less enthusiasm.
“The amendments are a historic mess never seen before in the annals of Maltese Constitution lawmaking,” Kevin Aquilina said, adding that the new system "makes banana republics shame themselves for not having adopted the new Maltese method of judicial appointment procedure themselves.”
Among the flaws highlighted by critics of the new system are the fact that the Prime Minister can choose to ignore the judicial appointments committee's recommendations and nominate whoever they please, that the committee cannot rank candidates and that the committee's own evaluation criteria require ministerial approval.
Note: Article amended to clarify that both applicants passed the judicial appointment committee evaluation process.