Turnout: 87.42%
About this election
Malta held a snap general election on 30 May 2026. The governing Labour Party (Partit Laburista) of Prime Minister Robert Abela won a fourth consecutive term with 51.77% of the vote and 36 seats, ahead of the Nationalist Party (Partit Nazzjonalista) under its new leader Alex Borg on 44.68% and 31 seats. Smaller parties together took about 3.5% and won no seats. Turnout was a very high 87.42%, in line with Malta's tradition of exceptional electoral participation. The result made Labour the first party in Maltese history to win four general elections in a row.
Labour has governed Malta since 2013, first under Joseph Muscat, who won landslides in 2013 and 2017, and since 2020 under Robert Abela, who led the party to victory in 2022. Abela's tenure has been marked by strong economic growth alongside continuing debate over governance and the rule of law, themes rooted in the scandals of the Muscat era and the legacy of the 2017 murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. Abela called the 2026 election early, citing the need for a fresh mandate amid geopolitical instability.
Malta elects its House of Representatives by the single transferable vote (STV), a candidate-based form of proportional representation, across 13 districts each returning five members. Voters rank individual candidates in order of preference. To keep the chamber proportional to the national party vote — and to correct gender imbalance — additional seats can be added on top of the 65 district seats, which is why the size of the House varies from election to election; in 2026 it stood at 67. The party commanding a majority forms the government.
Maltese politics is one of the most strongly two-party systems in Europe. Labour (PL), social-democratic and dominant since 2013, faced the Nationalist Party (PN), the centre-right opposition, now led by Alex Borg following a change at the top after years in opposition. The Green party ADPD and the newer Momentum contested but, as ever under STV in five-member districts, could not clear the effective threshold to win seats. The contest was, in practice, a straight choice between the two large parties.
As a snap election, the campaign was compressed, and Labour framed it as a request for continuity and stability in an uncertain international environment. The Nationalists, under a new leader, sought to narrow the gap that had opened in the landslide years and to recover ground on governance and cost-of-living issues. The closeness of the vote share — a margin of about seven points — was narrower than Labour's crushing wins of the previous decade.
Labour's win was decisive but more modest than the landslides of 2013 and 2017, suggesting a partial Nationalist recovery under fresh leadership even as Labour extended its run in office. The 36-31 seat split reflected the underlying two-party balance, with the proportionality mechanism translating the vote shares closely into seats.
Malta consistently records some of the highest voluntary turnouts in the democratic world, and 87.42% — spread across early-voting days and election day — was no exception. That intense participation, combined with STV in small multi-member districts, sustains a political system in which the two major parties absorb almost the entire vote and smaller parties struggle to break through.
Labour's victory in 2026 extended a dominance that began with Muscat's 2013 breakthrough and continued through 2017 and Abela's 2022 win. Winning a fourth straight election is unprecedented in Malta's modern two-party era, in which power had previously alternated between Labour and the Nationalists every decade or so.
Robert Abela was sworn in for a new term on 1 June 2026, and a reshuffled cabinet was announced on 3 June. The Nationalist Party, having improved its position, continues as the main opposition under Alex Borg.
Maltese politics has been shadowed for years by the 2017 car-bomb assassination of the investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia and by inquiries into high-level corruption during the Muscat administration. A public inquiry found the state bore responsibility for failing to prevent the murder, and the European Union and Council of Europe have repeatedly pressed Malta on the rule of law, judicial independence and its passport-sale scheme. These questions remained part of the backdrop to the 2026 campaign even as Labour's economic record took centre stage.
A fourth-term Labour government is expected to continue Malta's growth model — built on financial services, online gaming, construction and tourism — while remaining under European scrutiny over governance and the rule of law. The Nationalist Party, having recovered some ground under Alex Borg, faces the task of rebuilding toward a future challenge after more than a decade out of power.
Electoral Commission of Malta.
Compiled and reviewed by Bartłomiej Paruzel, Election Data Analyst, from official results. See our data methodology.