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| Maltese President George Abela (R) casts his vote at a polling station in Valletta, Malta, on March 9, 2013. Maltese voters went to polling booths on Saturday in a parliamentary election. (Xinhua/Xu Nizhi) |
VALLETTA, March 9 (Xinhua) -- Maltese voters went to polling booths on Saturday in a parliamentary election that polls showed would bring the current opposition Labor Party to power.
Some 320,000 registered voters are expected to cast their ballots between 7 a.m. (0600 GMT) and 10 p.m. (2100 GMT) Saturday, with vote counting starting on Sunday.
Latest opinion polls suggest that the Labor Party was ahead by 12 percentage points against the Nationalist Party, which has been in power for the last 15 years.
A win for Labor would see Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi make way for 39-year-old Joseph Muscat, a former member of the European Parliament who is calling for a change in direction for the next five years on the island state.
The Nationalists took Malta, which has a relatively thriving economy, into the European Union in 2004 and introduced the euro in 2008.
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