Darren Carabott calls for ‘courageous’ decision on Manoel Island

Darren Carabott has become the latest Nationalist MP to support a renegotiation of the Manoel Island project so that it is returned to the public as a park.

“The environment, open spaces, aesthetics and greenery are a need in today’s world and not a luxury. And if it is a need for the Maltese people, then everything can be done in the public interest,” Carabott wrote in a Facebook post.

The PN MP said in light of the party’s belief that the environment should be offered constitutional protection, it has to believe in the people’s right to enjoy open spaces.

“We have to be courageous and bring about change—including in projects that have been planned for 20 years such as Manoel Island and we are still with the chance of changing them,” Carabott said.

He is the latest PN MP to publicly defy the position of Nationalist Leader Bernard Grech, who said contracts must be respected.

MPs Albert Buttigieg, Graziella Attard Previ, Eve Borg Bonello, Claudette Buttigieg, Rebekah Borg, Graham Bencini, Ivan Bartolo and Ivan Castillo have all called for a renegotiation of the Manoel Island contract.

Albert Buttigieg has also requested a discussion within the PN’s parliamentary group before a petition that collected 29,000 signatures is discussed in parliament’s Petitions Committee.

Manoel Island, along with Tigné Point, were granted on a 99-year lease to MIDI plc, a private company, in 2000 to be developed with luxury apartments and commercial premises.

The project on Manoel Island has so far not kicked off—only excavation works have been carried out and a master plan published—and activists behind the petition are asking the government to take the island back and turn it into a national park.

The developers insist this is not something they can negotiate, insisting that plans they have submitted with the Planning Authority will leave 60% of the island undeveloped.

A clause in the contract stipulates that the project should be substantially completed by March next year and failure to do so gives the government a right to claim back the land. Nonetheless, MIDI plc has argued that the contract also allows for an extension of that deadline if there were delays beyond the company’s control. MIDI CEO Mark Portelli has said that delays in the planning process and the discovery of archaeological finds justify an extension of the deadline.

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