Local Councils Association president resigns to take up public service role

Marc Sant, the president of the Local Councils Association (LCA) has resigned from his position in order to take up public service role.

In a letter sent to mayors and councillors, Sant, who is also a member the Hal-Lija local council, said that he had resigned as of the end of March since his new role precludes him from occupying posts of a political nature.

Sant said that in the four years that he held his position he had tried to address several “fundamental and structural problems” facing local councils while expressing his disappointment at the fact that these problems remain and will persist as long as “things remain the same”.

The outgoing president called on members of the executive committee to be more proactive and to lead by example by discussing policy-formulation and putting forward feasible and studied proposals “rather than pushing their own personal agendas or acting in a petty partisan manner”.

Moreover, he said that he could not understand the reason for the “resistance to basic issues of transparency and accountability” within the association such as placing minutes of LCA executive committee meetings and the schedule of payments online.

While Sant said he believes more could have been achieved during his tenure, he said that the association had done well, especially when considering its limited resources. Moreover, he assured councillors that he would be leaving the LCA is a “financially sound” state.