Fishermen say dining tables get in the way

Fishermen from Xatt is-Sajjieda, in Spinola where restaurant patrons dine al fresco have launched a campaign informing tourists that the space is needed by them. Sitting in the shade provided by the arches built by Fra Giovanni Battista Spinola, the Captain General of the Galleys, as a shelter for boats in the time of the Knights of St John, fishermen lament they are being elbowed out.

Alex Cuschieri, a 51-year-old full-time fisherman, as his grandfather and great grandfather also were, said he is fed up by "tactics" to squeeze him and his fishing boats out of the area.

"I have lived all my life fishing and selling my catch. It's a tough life but having to struggle to have a parking space for your trailer and boat is making it unnecessarily tougher. We were here before the restaurants came. It's not fair that they can work and I cannot. Everyone has the right to make a living. I am not asking for anything but the right to be allowed to work," he said.

Mr Cuschieri said it was rather ironic that postcards and pictures used for tourist promotion depicted the area with colourful fishing boats yet, now, dining tables for restaurant patrons are leaving no space for fishermen where to work, he said. Mario Borg, president of the Ghaqda Sajjieda u Dilettanti Giljanizi, which embraces over 100 members, including a number of full time fishermen, said they were making representations with the Fisheries Department about the matter.

"We have nothing against restaurants there but they can't keep being given land at our expense," he said.

Peter Darmanin, owner of Café Raffael, whose tables the fishermen are protesting against, said he was given the space by the Lands Department, adding that no tables and chairs would be in the area in question between the end of October and April 1.

"Fishing boats are usually at sea at this time of the year but, for some reason, they decided to haul them up early this year. I have the necessary permits from Mepa and the Lands Department, so I am not doing anything wrong. I have actually embellished the area," he said.

Mr Cuschieri, however, argues that the land area allocated to restaurants for tables and chairs has extended over the years and fishermen were now hemmed in such a constrained space that there was no elbow room to manoeuvre a boat.

Asked to explain, a spokesman for the Lands Department said San Guiliano Catering Ltd, which runs Café Raffael, enjoyed an encroachment permit for the placing of tables and chairs on an area adjacent to the loggias which the same company holds on emphyteusis since 1989.

Early this year, the company obtained clearance from Mepa, the Malta Tourism Authority and St Julians local council to extend the site on which tables and chairs can be placed.

The encroachment permit was issued this May and part of the area was subjected to a condition imposed by the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, laying down that it can be used only between April 1 and October 31.

The fishermen insist that the way the tables occupy the space they were able to use in the past means they can no longer service their boats or store their implements.