The crucial counting of votes cast in yesterday’s general election is scheduled for 11:00h but this could be delayed by a few minutes as the conciliation of ballot papers is still ongoing.

Early this morning, a handful of local council election votes were found in various general election boxes and these had to be reconciled accordingly while delaying the conciliation process.

At 08:00h there were around 70 ballot boxes that still had to be opened.

The opening of ballot boxes started yesterday evening soon after the voting ended at 22:00h and the conciliation of ballots cast continued in earnest throughout the night and continues until all boxes are opened.

Rumours doing the rounds that the Zabbar, Cospicua and Zejtun voting was extended by a few minutes beyond 22:00h yesterday evening were dispelled by party officials who spoke to di-ve.com this morning. They explained that a significant turnout in these particular localities led to queues forming throughout most of the day but the voting closed at the agreed time.