Maximum adjudication time for the full EDR process (days)

General Elections Act (Chapter 354), 1991-09-27.

PART IX Nomination of Candidates

Nomination of Candidates.

51. …

(8) The Commission shall atleast two days before delivering its decision publicly announce the time anddate when its decision shall be delivered. The decision shall be delivered inwriting and shall contain the grounds upon which it is based. The Commissionshall cause such decision to be posted up in a public place at its office whereany person interested may view it:

(9) Where the decision ofthe Commission does not uphold the objection, it shall be final. Where thedecision upholds the objection the candidate may contest the decision by filingan application in contestation with the Commission before the Court of Appealwithin twenty four hours of the delivery of the decision by the Commission. The Court o f Appeal shall hearsuch applications with urgency and shall determine the same before the timewhen in terms of article 49 the Commission is to start printing the ballotpapers.

Ballot Paper.

49. (1) The Commission shall, not earlier than thirteen days but not laterthan ten days before the poll, print such number of ballot papers as may benecessary for the poll in such form and on such material as may be prescribedunder this Act. Not later than five days from the printing of the ballotpapers, the Commission shall produce a Braille template for use as a guide onthe ballot paper as well as a playback listening device by which a blind personmay recognize the political parties and their candidates in the same manner asthey are printed. Such materials shall be available for reasonable scrutiny bythe representatives of the political parties contesting the poll to ascertainthe transparency of the procedure, which scrutiny shall be exercised not laterthan three days before the poll. Should no objection be raised the materialsshall be deemed to have been approved by the Commission:

Provided that any objection raised by any political party representativeshall be decided by the Commission within twenty four hours of it being raisedand should the objection be accepted by the Commission any alteration oramendment to the material shall be made within twenty-four hours of the decisionof the representatives.

(2) The Commission shall ensure that ballot papers are made of suchsecurity paper and carry such markings as to ensure that they may not beduplicated and not later than two days prior to the commencement of the voting,the Commission shall cause to be published in the Government Gazette the numberof ballot papers printed for each electoral division and the number to bedistributed to each individual polling booth.

(3) The ballot-paper of each voter shall consist of a paper in the formset out in the Eighth Schedule of this Act, containing a list of candidatesdescribed by the name (including any nickname), address and profession oroccupation as given in their respective nomination paper and as approved by theElectoral Commissioners.

(4) Candidates shall be arranged by political party and, within eachparty group alphabetically in the order of their surname. If there are two ormore candidates of one party with the same surname, they will be arranged inorder of their other name or names.

(5) Every political party contesting the election shall provide theCommission with the names of the candidates contesting the election in its owninterest. Such list shall be conclusive evidence as to whether a particularcandidate belongs to that political party.

(6) If supplied by the party to which he belongs, there shall be printedon the ballot paper immediately after the name of each candidate belonging tothat party any badge or device, approved by the Electoral Commission,indicating the political party, if any, to which the candidate belongs, orotherwise calculated to assist the identification of the candidate by the  voter.

(7) Ballot-papers shall show different colours for parties contestingall electoral divisions and having not less than four candidates in eachdivision. Such colours shall be assigned by the Electoral Commission:

Provided that any party may decline the colour so assigned to it, and inany such case the ballot paper shall not show any special colour for thatparty.

(8) Parties will be placed on the ballot paper in alphabetical order.

Ministry for Justice, Justice Services

http://www.justiceservices.gov.mt/DownloadDocument.aspx?app=lom&itemid=8824&l=1 as retrieved on26-09-13.

OSCE/ODIHRElection Assessment Mission Final Report, Parliamentary Elections Republic ofMalta, (2013-03-09)

XIII. COMPLAINTS AND APPEALS

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Objections to candidatenominations should be filed with the EC within two days of the expiration ofthe deadline for receipt of nominations and he Court of Appeal examines appealsagainst EC decisions that uphold objections against candidate nominations.

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While such requests must be filedwithin 21 days from the date the voter is informed of the decision by the EC, there are no specified deadlinesfor considering these cases. However, the law does provide that theRevising Officers and the Court of Appeal should consider all election-relateddisputes 14 days before election day. Additionally, the law does not provide adeadline for the Constitutional Court to adjudicate petitions referred to it.

Office for DemocraticInstitutions and Human Rights,