MEPA halts illegal Polidano works

Construction magnate Charles Polidano’s company had illegal works being carried out on his Montekristo Estates in Safi halted by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority in yet another milestone of planning abuse for the company.

The works halted on Friday were, according to Polidano Bros spokesperson and lawyer Jean Paul Sammut, embellishment and landscaping works and fencing and boundary works for an area in which Polidano Group houses a small zoo.

The company is to face criminal charges over its illegal animal park at Montekristo Estates, the Animal Rights Parliamentary Secretariat said last week. The Montekristo Estates Animal Park had already been served with at least two letters of warning by the Veterinary Directorate over the conditions in which its animals are kept.

Some 61 species at the illegal zoo benefit from international protection under Cites, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, and include pumas, jungle cats, Eurasian lynxes, Barbary macaques (monkeys), ring-tailed lemurs, a caracal (wild cat), a lion and an ocelot.

The animal park is on an illegally developed site subject to an enforcement notice issued in 2008.

News of the illegal works being halted emerged from a letter to The Times, sent in reply to questions on roadworks being carried out by Polidano Group as an access to Montekristo Estates, which spokesperson Sammut insisted on publicising with the rest of the media.

Sammut denied that the roadworks were creating a new access point to Montekristo. “The road is a public one, accessible to everyone, and has been there before the group was even established. The only works carried out in this road was using a roller truck to level out inert material in the area, at the company’s expense and for the benefit of the public making use of this road.”

Sammut claimed there was an agreement with MEPA when it issued a permit for its Poligas plant, to provide an access road for emergency vehicles to enter and exit to the fire factories behind the plant. “The road improvements, an action of Polidano Group for the benefit of the general public, is attributed to the sole gain of the company.”

Sammut lost no time in lauding the work of Polidano and his group, which despite numerous abuses and planning enforcement orders issued against it, has hosted numerous events patronized even by the President of the Republic, Joseph Muscat on being elected leader of the Labour Party, and government ministers.

“Over 100 trucks of soil were added over the past months and hundreds of plants and trees were also planted. Over the years the Group has planted over 200,000 trees and plants mostly matured, in the whole area of MonteKristo including citrus trees, carob trees, olive trees, pencil pine trees, Leyland trees and grape vines among others, all Mediterranean trees.”

It is now understood that following the criminal charges being issued over the animal park, Polidano Group has been busy building bigger housing and zoning areas for the over 2,000 animals it keeps. “Additional land was required in order to give the animals the largest space and best environment possible,” Sammut said. 

Sammut said that any documents on CITES permits for the animals had been passed over to MEPA officials and an inspection was held on Friday morning.