Getting the record straight

Martin Scicluna, executive president of Din l-Art Helwa, writes (April 7) that DLH has followed "with interest" the recent exchanges between officials and former ministers on Mepa's responsibilities and that "political pressure or interference in the way Mepa operates is not the answer". I entirely endorse his view but surely to accuse former ministers of exercising "political" pressure simply because they externalise their thoughts in print does overstretch the elasticity of one's imagination.

Mr Scicluna goes on to say that "two recent ex-ministerial interventions ( a clear reference to Michael Falzon and me) follow in the wake of one by the Leader of the Opposition some 18 months ago when he implied that there might be circumstances in which he would choose to by-pass Mepa in a future government of his. Such approaches must be resisted".

Mr Falzon was the minister who created Mepa and built it into a bulwark against abuse. Both of us were long-serving members of a government that established the authority and annually voted funding to facilitate its operations and make them possible. It was when both or either were in office that we could have effectively exercised pressure and recommended the application of a specific part of Mepa legislation that exceptionally empowers the government to "by-pass Mepa", but we did not.

My contributions to the current golf course debate actually state the contrary and stress that Mepa should not be by-passed. When I addressed the Royal Malta Golf Club membership I specifically discounted the option that the government should solve the impasse and apply its residual powers to impose its will on Mepa. In my subsequent letter (The Sunday Times, March 14) I stated that Mepa had "tangibly limited environmental rape, changed the former prevailing culture of patronage, made land use planning the norm and not the exception" and that Mepa "should display greater transparency and efficiency".

Moreover, had Din l-Art Helwa's executive president followed the debate carefully, and not simply "with interest", he would also have noticed that my February 7 address (The Times, February 10) concluded with the statement that the government should not impose the approval of a particular golf course on Mepa but commission Mepa "to identify a suitable site" and therefore "give the green light to golf course development".

There is therefore no parallel between what I have said and written and the possible implications of the Leader of the Opposition's musings.