The culture minister’s claim that Fort Chambray is being returned to the historic vision of the knights is “a baseless argument”, a student association said on Saturday.  

“One can rest assured that the fort’s designers had no intention of installing a hotel, bars and other such commercial structures in a fortified town,” the Malta University Historical Society said in a statement endorsed by nine other student organisations. 

Earlier this week, a spokesperson for the culture ministry said plans to demolish British-era barracks at Gozo’s Fort Chambray align with the “historical vision” of the fort by the Knights of St John.  

Those plans, recently approved by the Planning Authority, include dismantling the British barracks and relocating them to another part of the fort.  

A hotel and apartment complex will then be built where the historic structure now stands.  

The 10 student organisations join a louder chorus of disapproval to the plans.  

Several NGOs, including Din l-Art Ħelwa - Għawdex, Wirt Għawdex, Għawdix, and Moviment Graffitti, slammed the PA for its “haste to recommend the destruction and development” of the fort. 

In a statement on Saturday, the Malta Historical Society said the culture ministry’s point on the “historical” vision of the knights “is a baseless argument which, if applied to every historic site in Malta, would cause chaos”.   

“Fort St Angelo would need dismantling to return it to its medieval state. The art adorning St John’s Co-Cathedral would need removing as the church was originally designed to be austere with modest decoration.”

They said the PA’s green light for the project sets a “perilous precedent of sidelining the elements which make Malta unique - and in many ways, viable  in favour of unchecked growth and development”.  

“Future history and architecture students will be unable to visit and study these sites for their structural and cultural value. Future Gozitans will lose part of their island’s heritage.  

“Future tourists will never see the welcoming approach to Gozo, but a tower of concrete where there once sat the bulwark of the island against enemy landings," they warned. 

“Our history is not simply a tourist trap or a political tool to glorify or vilify when and as needed. Our history is our story, and its preservation (or destruction) affects our collective identity,” they said.