The government claims it has rebuilt 1,315 roads over the past six years but says it is too much work to list them, turning down a freedom of information request filed by Times of Malta this summer.

Transport Minister Chris Bonett told parliament in June that the €700m project to rebuild all of Malta’s roads was almost complete, with the government having rebuilt 1,315 roads in the six years since the project was launched in 2018.

The project had been one of the Labour Party’s main electoral pledges in the previous year’s election.

Describing the intensity of work carried out as “unprecedented”, Bonett told MPs that works on the remaining 200 roads would be completed by the end of 2025. This cost over €634.2m to date, Bonnett said, with another €65.8m earmarked for the remaining roads.

Which roads?

Days after Bonett’s claim, Times of Malta asked the transport ministry for a list of roads that have been completed, those still in the pipeline and how much each completed road had cost.

Despite repeated assurances that the list would be provided, this never transpired.

A freedom of information request asking for the same information was filed in August, eventually making its way to Infrastructure Malta’s door.

But the entity turned down the request saying the resources needed to compile the list and provide the information sought would “substantially and unreasonably divert the resources of the public authority from its other operations”.

It remains unclear how the precise figure of 1,315 roads completed roads was reached without the authorities already having totted them up.

Nor is it clear how the government has identified the remaining 200 roads without this list or how their total cost was calculated.

Boilerplate replies

This is not the first time that the transport ministry has been reticent to provide information about ongoing, publicly funded roadworks.

In June, Bonett provided identical boilerplate replies to a series of parliamentary questions by Nationalist Party infrastructure spokesperson Joe Giglio about the cost of four ongoing projects, before eventually tabling the costings days later.

Meanwhile, residents in several localities have reported facing seemingly endless roadworks and delayed road projects.

Residents in Manikata have turned to the ombudsman to investigate delays to the ongoing roadworks in the area, with the project now in its final stretch, three years after works began.

Roadworks in Msida faced similar delays, eventually being completed earlier this year, nine months behind schedule.

Transport Malta last year pledged to step up its monitoring of contractors in an effort to cut down on delays in works being completed.