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A postcard from MEPA... €853,581 direct order to Maltapost Plc
Maltapost plc scanned confidential documents and planning applications at MaltaPost branch in Gozo for the sum of €853,581.
3 May 2012, 12:00am
James Debono
James Debono
2 min read
Not just postal employees: Maltapost was outsourced secretarial work by MEPA.
An €853,581 five-year contract for the scanning of planning documents was awarded to Maltapost plc through a direct order.
The contract awarded under former Malta Environment and Planning Authority chairman Andrew Calleja, covered the period between November 2006 and 2011.
Maltapost is a public company listed on the stock exchange, which is partially owned by Redbox Ltd, a subsidiary of Lombard Bank whose chief executive is Heritage Malta chairman Joe Said.
The contract - which expired last year - was not renewed.
MaltaToday is informed that confidential documents like planning applications had to be transferred to a MaltaPost branch in Gozo to be scanned.
In April 2011, MaltaPost chief executive Joe Gafa was quoted in the media saying that "through this back office solution" mail-like planning application documents were opened and scanned and then resent to MEPA officials' terminals.
"With a guarantee for confidentiality, MaltaPost is able to process highly sensitive documents for a range of clients in a similar manner," Gafa said.
Asked how MEPA ensured that the confidentiality of the documents was respected, a spokesperson for the Authority insisted that the contract signed between MEPA and MaltaPost contained specific conditions, which ensured strict standards of confidentiality with respect to any data delivered to MaltaPost by MEPA.
"Until the date when the contract was terminated last November, the Authority had never received a report that any of these conditions had been breached."
MEPA claims that the contract was not renewed because documentation submitted physically to the authority has decreased as a result of the online application system.
The online procedure introduced in the MEPA reform process stipulates that all planning applications, relevant documentation and any correspondence between architects and the Authority has to be made electronically through MEPA's e-Applications system.
As a result of this, the documentation and correspondence submitted in physical format has decreased significantly, and the workload for scanning documents and correspondence has become manageable - which can be handled internally, the MEPA spokesperson told MaltaToday.
"This measure has not only increased the efficiency levels in the processing of planning applications but has also enable the Authority to reduce its expenditure," the spokesperson added.
James Debono is MaltaToday's chief reporter on environment, planning and land use issues, ...
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Remuneration can take many forms, overt or covert. Unfortunately, our citizens have not matured enough to vote with their heads, and therefore vote for Malta's real progress. Or have they and they know something we do not? Or are they simply mindlessly, robotically eating/have eaten the nation's assets and degraded them to such an extent that our children will have been left with no, or a very dirty environment to enjoy/suffer. By looking after their very narrow interests and voting for their team who unjustly rewards them with most of the nation's wealth, whilst leaving behind the "others". Then when it is the "others" turn, they do the same with what is left following the marauding by the previous parliamentary incumbents. No wonder the better educated young are deserting our shores.
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BETTER FUTURE can anyone blame the people if they think that commission has been paid?
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Isn't MaltaPost a private monopoly and part Lombard Bank? Doesn't MEPA form part of the wider Public sector with oodles of manpower within it's extended ranks? So what gives? Why the direct contract?
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At that price MEPA could have bought its own scanning machine and employed at least anothe 2 peopel to run it.
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I hope that the new PL Government revokes the contract because a ġpublic tender should have been issued and the contract was awarded without such a tender rendering it illegal.
