Manoel Island petition exceeds 5,100 signatures in first two weeks

A parliamentary petition calling on the government to turn Manoel Island into a public park has amassed over 5,000 signatures in just two weeks, a spokesperson for the campaign told Times of Malta on Saturday.

The campaign, ‘Manoel Island Post Għalina (A Place for Us)', is led by Moviment Graffitti and Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar and has been endorsed by over 40 organisations and NGOs, including Din l-Art Ħelwa, Richmond Foundation, the Church's Environment Commission, and Kamra tal-Periti.

The parliamentary petition calls for the creation of a publicly accessible park in the heavily urbanised north harbour region, and for the government and MIDI to negotiate the return of Manoel Island to the public, scrapping planned commercial and residential units and replacing them with green open spaces.

The day it was publicly launched, on March 29, the petition garnered over 1,600 signatures. At the time of writing it had reached 5,143 signatures. The petition will be open until May 25.

“This is encouraging and the speed with which we reached this number of signatures has exceeded our expectations but it is not surprising,” campaign spokesperson Robert Louis Fenech said.

“A similar petition a few years ago had amassed around 7,800 signatures so we know there is already a lot of support for this. We hope to exceed that.”

He added that this petition has already collected the highest number of signatures of any petition in this legislature and is one of the most popular petitions since the petitioning mechanism was introduced in 2017.

“We are not surprised. We know this is a popular issue. People like Manoel Island and they want it to be a national heritage park. This can be a really groundbreaking movement. We are making a clear demand that will improve Malta's landscape, social fabric and our quality of life," Fenech said.

"This campaign is a first of its kind in that it is a positive campaign. We are very happy the campaign has reached this level at this relatively early stage and we hope to get considerably more numbers." 

Last Sunday campaign activists set up an information stand outside Fort Manoel during an open day organised by the project’s developers MIDI. 

Developer MIDI said that claims that a substantial part of Manoel Island is destined for development are incorrect and misleading.

"The reality is that 80% of the MIDI concession will be dedicated to public open spaces and heritage buildings while the new buildings will only occupy 8% with the remaining 12% earmarked for other open spaces and circulation," MIDI said.