Updated 2.14pm
The government has appointed Saviour Camilleri to chair the Building and Construction Authority.
Prime Minister Robert Abela revealed the government’s pick to lead the BCA while answering journalists’ questions during a press conference on Friday morning.
The appointment was later confirmed through a statement issued by the Planning and Public Works Ministry.
Camilleri, who has since retired, is a draughtsman by profession and also served on Fgura's local council as a Labour Party councillor. He was mayor from 1994-2000 and stepped down as a councillor in 2009.
The BCA serves as the construction sector’s regulator and is responsible for overseeing respect for building rules and practices.
Its previous chairperson, Maria Schembri Grima, resigned on Wednesday after Times of Malta published a video showing the dangerous demolition of a major project she was leading as an architect.
Video of the Psaila Street demolition showed entire walls of stones being knocked into the street, past protective hoarding erected for the project.
The project developer, Joseph Portelli’s Excel Investments, as well as Schembri Grima both blamed the demolition contractor responsible, Polidano, for the dangerous works. Polidano hit back by saying it had followed the architect’s instructions.
Both companies were fined by the BCA.
The incident is now being probed by the Chamber of Architects and Civil Engineers, which is also looking into Schembri Grima’s role in the project.
Schembri Grima's role 'untenable'
Speaking on Friday, the prime minister admitted that Schembri Grima’s role had become “untenable after what happened” and that she had tendered her resignation as a result.
Schembri Grima was first appointed to the top BCA role in 2021 and her selection raised a number of questions, given she also serves as a full-time architect with a client list that includes moguls such as Portelli, his business partner Mark Agius and Malta Developers' Association president Michael Stivala.
Critics had highlighted the conflict of interest concerns about a practicing architect also chairing the regulator of the sector she operated in.
It is a concern that has dogged the BCA since it was set up.
Legislators originally planned to also have representatives from the Chamber of Architects ad Malta Developers Association on the BCA board. But the chamber immediately dismissed that suggestion, with the MDA eventually following suit.
In opting to replace Schembri Grima with the retired Camilleri, the government appears to have tacitly acknowledged the problem of having a practising architect as head of the construction regulator.
The prime minister emphasised that chairing the BCA is a non-executive role, given that the entity has a CEO that manages day-to-day operations.
While CEOs were engaged full-time, it was up for debate whether the same rule should apply to non-executive chairpersons, he said.
Part of the challenge is that non-executive chairs of state entities do not get paid very much, the prime minister said, making it more challenging to find full-time professionals to assume such roles without significantly improving remuneration.
There would be no such problem in this case, he noted, as Camilleri is a retiree.
PN wants parliament to grill new BCA chair
By law, the government is under no obligation to submit Camilleri's nomination to parliamentary scrutiny.
The Opposition, however, wants that to change.
In a statement on Friday, PN MPs Darren Carabott and Stanley Zammit said that the BCA chairperson role should be added to a list of posts that must be submitted for approval before an appointments committee in parliament.
"We are making this call to increase transparency and accountability for public appointments and to ensure that the BCA is led by a serious person with no conflicts of interest," the Opposition MPs said.
The BCA, they added, had so far failed to effectively control the "law of the jungle" that reigned in Malta's construction sector and was just adding to red tape for the sector.