Democratic Alternative ( mt, Alternattiva Demokratika), sometimes referred to as AD – The Green Party, was a

green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a combi ...

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or p ...

Malta Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...

. The party was initially founded by a coalition of former Labour Party members and environmental activists in 1989. On 1 August 2020 the party announced a plan to merge with the

Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to: *Democratic Party (United States) Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to: Active parties Africa *Botswana Democratic Party *Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea *Gabonese Democratic Party *Demo ...

to form a new party called

AD+PD AD+PD, also written as ADPD, is a green and progressive political party in Malta. The party was founded on 17 October 2020 by a merger of the two most prominent third parties in Malta, the green Democratic Alternative (AD) and the social libe ...

. The merger was conducted on 17 October 2020.

History

Alternattiva Demokratika was founded in 1989 when former

Malta Labour Party The Labour Party ( mt, Partit Laburista, PL), formerly known as the Malta Labour Party ( mt, Partit tal-Ħaddiema, MLP), is one of the two major political parties in Malta, along with the Nationalist Party. It sits on the centre-left of the p ...

President Toni Abela and former Labour MP and Parliamentary whip Wenzu Mintoff joined a number of

environmental activist The environmental movement (sometimes referred to as the ecology movement), also including conservation and green politics, is a diverse philosophical, social, and political movement for addressing environmental issues. Environmentalists advo ...

s to form the new political party. Abela and Mintoff had resigned their posts in protest at the presence of certain elements in the Labour Party tainted with political violence and corruption. For this Abela and Mintoff were expelled from the Labour Party. Mintoff retained his seat in Parliament and, between 1989 and 1992 was effectively an MP for the new party as well as its first Chairperson. Alternattiva Demokratika first stood for the 1992 national elections when it obtained 1.69% of first preference votes (their best result in a general election until 2013) and no seats. In the subsequent elections of 1996 and

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

the Party's share of the vote declined. Following the 1998 result, Abela and Mintoff resigned and returned to the Labour Party (Abela was to be elected Labour's Deputy Leader in 2008).

Harry Vassallo Harry Vassallo (born Enrico Vassallo) was the Chairperson of the Maltese Green political party, Democratic Alternative from 1998 till 2008. He was succeeded by Prof. Arnold Cassola. Vassallo studied at the University of Malta from where he grad ...

replaced Mintoff as Chairperson of the Party in 1999. In 2003 the party campaigned for a ''Yes'' vote in the referendum on membership in the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been de ...

. In the election that year the Party obtained only 0.7% of first preference votes having campaigned for second preference votes in order to secure the earlier referendum result and Malta's entry into the European Union. In 2004 the party obtained a remarkable result in the

European Parliament election Elections to the European Parliament take place every five years by universal adult suffrage; with more than 400 million people eligible to vote, they are considered the second largest democratic elections in the world after India's. Unti ...

with 9.33% of first preference votes cast and the party's candidate,

Arnold Cassola Arnold Cassola is a Maltese and Italian independent politician, professor, author and editor of various books and academic papers. Cassola is a professor in Comparative Literature at the University of Malta. He has held elective office and pol ...

narrowly failing to be elected as MEP. In the Maltese general election of 2008, the party increased its share of the vote to 1.31%. After ten years at the helm, Vassallo resigned as Chairperson and was replaced by

Cassola Cassola ( vec, Casoła) is a town in the province of Vicenza, Veneto, Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterran ...

. Barely a year later Cassola handed his resignation following the Party's poor showing at the

European Parliament Election Elections to the European Parliament take place every five years by universal adult suffrage; with more than 400 million people eligible to vote, they are considered the second largest democratic elections in the world after India's. Unti ...

in June 2009. Cassola was replaced by Michael Briguglio in October 2009 but returned to the helm following Briguglio's resignation in 2013. Carmel Cacopardo was elected to lead in 2017. In the general election of 2013, Alternattiva Demokratika obtained its best ever result with 5,506 votes (1.8%) in total across all districts where they ran candidates but failed to win a seat in parliament. The party's best result was in District 10 where then party leader Michael Briguglio received 741 first preference votes and a further 154 transfers before being eliminated after the 17th count. The quota for that district was 3,679 votes. After the election some Democratic Alternative supporters claimed this raised a number of issues regarding representation. Talks are expected to take place during a constitutional convention with regards to addressing anomalies with the current Maltese electoral system. Alternattiva Demokratika entered into preliminary coalition negotiations with the Nationalist Party in April 2017 to determine if they could cooperate to unseat the

Labour Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

government. The talks broke down when AD's proposal of a coalition running under a separate name, 'Qawsalla' ("Rainbow"), with a new policy platform was rejected by the Nationalists, who were willing to form the coalition only if AD candidates ran under the Nationalist ticket.

Media

In the 1990s, Alternattiva Demokratika had its own newspaper publication, ''Alternattiva'', whose editor in chief from 1989 until 1991 was

, and its own radio station,

Capital Radio Capital London is a radio station owned and operated by the Global media company as part of its national Capital FM Network. As Capital Radio it was launched in the London area in 1973 as one of Britain's first two commercial radio stations. ...

Leaders

* Wenzu Mintoff 1989–1999 *

1999–2008 *

2008–2009 * Michael Briguglio 2009–2013 *

2013–2017 * Carmel Cacopardo 2017–2020

Electoral history

House of Representatives elections

European parliamentary elections

References

External links

* {{Authority control Defunct political parties in Malta Green parties in Europe European Green Party Political parties established in 1989 Global Greens member parties 1989 establishments in Malta 2020 disestablishments in Malta Political parties disestablished in 2020