On 27 February 1955, Malta was in the middle of a three-day general election (26–28 February) that would end with Dom Mintoff’s Labour Party winning a clear majority, and with it, the mandate that would carry Mintoff into Castille as Prime Minister for the first time a couple of weeks later. He was sworn in on 11 March 1955. To understand why this moment mattered, you have to picture Malta in the mid-1950s: still a British colony, still shaped by the aftershocks of war, and e

On 22 January 1984 , Archbishop Mikiel Gonzi died at the age of 99, closing a chapter that had shaped Malta’s political, religious and social life for much of the twentieth century. Few individuals exercised comparable influence over the islands during a period marked by war, decolonisation, ideological conflict and rapid social change. His episcopate, which lasted from 1944 to 1976, coincided almost exactly with Malta’s transition from a British fortress colony into an indep

Discover the story of Malta’s 1961 Interdett, when Archbishop Gonzi clashed with Dom Mintoff’s Labour Party. Learn how the Church declared supporting Labour a mortal sin, its impact on Maltese society, and how the conflict shaped politics until reconciliation in 1969.