Dominicans open to consider alternative sites for new school

The Dominican Province today said that comparisons between its plan to construct a school in ODZ land in Ghaxaq and government’s plan to sell ODZ land in Marsaskala to a foreign construction group were “unfair.”

While insisting that planned school in Ghaxaq was within an area earmarked for educational purposes by MEPA, the order added that it was open to other realistic proposals by government.

The Dominicans plan to relocate St Albert College from its current site in Valletta to Ghaxaq and in defence of these plans, Provincial Frans Micallef said MEPA’s local plan for the south earmarked the selected land for educational purposes.

“The site was selected following a two-year exercise, in which over 20 sites were evaluated together with MEPA,” adding that the authority concluded that the site was the most suitable because it caused the least impact on the environment.

Moreover, Micallef said the Ghaxaq school cannot be compared to the proposal to build a private university in Zonqor point, Marsaskala because the order’s project was of a social nature “which will benefit the education of all Maltese people.”

The provincial added that it is open to realistic to alternative sites which might be offered by government, possibly in the south of Malta.

The statement comes after repeated calls for the Church to drop its plans for the building of the college on virgin land in Ghaxaq.

Front Harsien ODZ has called on the Church to abandon its two applications to build Church schools in Ghaxaq as the project would obliterate more than 77,000 square metres of agricultural land, including rubble walls and mature trees.

“There is still time to save this land, and the Church has an opportunity to give a powerful example to the rest of society, strengthening the environmental conscience of the nation on environmental and also ethical and moral grounds. We call on the church to not only seriously reconsider but also relocate this project inside the development zone, or alternatively negotiate with the Government to occupy one of the presently empty public schools,” the front said in a statement issued last week.

AD reacts

Alternattiva Demokratika Chairperson, Prof. Arnold Cassola said, "We welcome the Dominicans' openness to relocate St. Albert's College beyond the previously planned Ghaxaq site. 

"This is the real way forward. The college should be built on already disturbed land. It now becomes an urgent priority for the government to identify an area which suits such conditions".