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MEPA board should resign over Mistra decision – green NGOs
Following Ombudsman report, green NGOs do not exclude legal challenge to Mistra development.
3 December 2013, 12:00am
Matthew Vella
Matthew Vella
2 min read
Veteran environmentalist Edward Mallia (left) and FAA chief Astrid Vella.
Green NGOs today insisted that the environmental ombudsman report on the Mistra development confirmed that the outline permit issued in 2009 was not cast in stone and could be "revoked and challenged."
Ombudsman David Pace said the board did not have its hands tied by the previous permit issued in 2008 and concluded that the original outline permit could have been revoked.
Moreover, the ombudsman said that the current MEPA board chaired by chairperson Vince Cassar was in breach of the law when it met in a private session to discuss the request to revoke the original permit issued for Mistra heights in 2008, the planning ombudsman said.
He also said secretive meetings were ruled out Article 6 of the Environment and Planning Act which states that "meetings of the Authority shall be open to the public". Although the law permits the board to deliberate in private, any vote has to be conducted in public.
Describing MEPA's decision to grant permission to the construction of 774 apartments on the former Mistra Village site as "obscene," Flimkien ghal-Ambjent Ahjar chief Astrid Vella said that the ombudsman's report proved the green lobby's resistance to the project was justified.
Vella and veteran environmentalist Edward Mallia subscribed to Alternattiva Demokratika's call for the resignation of the MEPA board and said that who ever wass responsible for decision not to revoke the permit behind closed doors should shoulder responsibility.
Following the approval, the parliamentary secretary for planning, Michael Farrugia said that had MEPA refused to issue permits for 774 apartments on the former Mistra Village it would have resulted in government paying the applicant up to €70 million in damages.
However, Mallia said that the parliamentary secreatry waas "shooting from the hip" and said that such claims were ludicrous.
On her part, Vella insisted that in his report, the ombudsman highlighted a number shortcomings in the outline permit and this confirmed that the MEPA board had "every right and reason to deny the permit."
She explained that the full development permit issued by MEPA was based on the Floor Area Ratio policy which has never been ratified.
Describing it as a "malicious" decision, Mallia said that the Mistra project, which will drastically alter the landscape was based on a policy which was never ratified.
While not excluding the possibility of challenging the full development permit on legal grounds, Vella said that an appeal could still be lodged at MEPA.
Matthew Vella, a freelance journalist at MaltaToday, was formerly executive editor at Malt...
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Every era of civilisation has witnessed evolutionary phenomena necessitating measures, mild or drastic, for the survival of man.
Rabat is a town littered with unexplored archaeological monuments, treasures and sites. Yet our ancestors and their successors dumped terrain all over the entire surface of Rabat to create a habitable zone - a town for the living in lieu of the catacombs (cemeteries) for the dead. They never bothered about pre-historic Arab or Roman remains. They had enough, they argued.
During the 60s when social imperatives demanded decent and affordable housing for a population on the fringes of poverty, extensive Roman remains in the vicinity of the Roman Villa were demolished to make way for what we now have as the Gheriexem Government Housing Estate. When objections to this development were raised with the then Minister Clo Caruana, he rightly replied : "The Romans have the City of Rome to live in and enjoy. I need flats for Maltese families and not partially-destroyed rubble walls of large boulders from antiquity".
Finally, allow me to ask one question. Shall we demolish all residential property in Rabat to unearth more archaeological remains for visitors to see?
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The Green NGO;s should have united and organised protests when Marsaskala residents' human rights were breached by the MEPA Board during the public meeting that decided the building of the recycling plant at Sant'Antnin in Marsaskala a few yards away from residents. Objectors were not allowed to express themselves while others were left outside in breach of the Development Planning Act. Ironically enough even on that occasion, the vote to build the plant at Marsaskala was taken behind closed doors in breach of the law. It appears that the Green NGO's did not consider that occasion serious enough to organise protests.
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It is great to see NGO's finding their role in Maltese society and creating a force for positive change outside the stranglehold of the political duopoly.
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These NGOs should take their case to court. Full stop!
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Possibly the only thing that can stem the rot is for the entire MEPA Board to be replaced by Astrid Vella and Edward Mallia. It has been quite obvious for some time that drastic action needs to be taken in this regard; Gonzi’s takeover was totally ineffectual, if not actually adding to the further rape of the Island. When will the powers that be realise; that enough is enough has already been surpassed.
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No we cannot keep on having such illogical at best and abusive at worse (in)/decisions, and then those who were involved, are at most simply let off the hook by resigning.
The same had happened with the MEPA Board members who sanctioned the 'permits bonanza' on the eve of the 2008 general elections - with some members then being appointed on other quango boards.
What is dearly needed is to have board members and senior public officers (including ministers and their appointees) assume PERSONAL responsibility for their actions or lack thereof - and thus be personally liable for claims of compensation for their wrongdoings.
