The contents of the article published in the Times of Malta (November 17) entitled “Malta’s waste management could be‘out of hand’” is, to say the least, appalling.

Malta’s environment is being left to rot in an unprecedented manner under the excuse that the economy is doing well. What economy is this if we are being burdened with irreperable environmental damage that is killing us gently, depriving us of our health and that of our children? 

Some corrupt individuals and turncoats are stashing away money when we, the common citizens, are losing the well-being we so rightly fought for over the years. 

The excess traffic, excess construction, excess pollution is taking its toll and now we are being told, by the environment authority, that Malta is falling foul of waste management directives. Shame on you!

Waste management is spiralling out of control and now we have ample proof to show it. This is not something that is being reported by myself but is being categorically stated by the environment authority. When tabled evidence in Parliament showed how WasteServ is abusing its position, dealing with waste in an unenvironmentally acceptable manner, government’s propoganda broke loose to convince the law-abiding citizens differently. 

Now, this time, the authority is being accused of leaking information to undermine government efforts and that waste management is challenging in its own right. 

For the government to rebut the aforementioned article by stating that waste management is challenging shows how this subject, after years of development and investment, has downshifted because a bunch of inadequate officials are using it for the sole purpose of filling their pockets as well as populate WasteServ with constituents rather than tackling the problem head-on. 

The government is now telling us that the solution is incineration. No, the solution is not incineration. Waste-to-energy should be contemplated only to deal with refuse derived fuels (RDF), that is, that fraction of waste that has no value other than the recovery of energy. 

However, incinerating all of Malta’s waste to cover up inefficiencies in this administration falls foul of the efforts that many households are putting to sort out the domestic waste they generate. 

You can see it coming; soon government propoganda will start drumming up the message that ‘we’ve tried and the people failed us… incineration is our only hope’. Naturally, the larger the incinerator the larger the commissions!

Such abuse of power by a minister who is incompetent at sorting out a mess he himself created is disheartening. Let me make it clear before the trolls jump up to the occasion: when Malta joined the EU and a lot of investment went into waste management, the road was far from complete. 

As a matter of fact, in 2013 when the then minister responsible for waste, Leo Brincat, took office, he stopped all efforts on waste-to-energy that the PN administration had initiated. 

Such abuse of power by a minister who is incompetent at sorting out a mess he himself created is disheartening

For Brincat, it was too hot to handle and he chickened out allowing his successor to potentially double the incinerator to be procured.

Then they set up a waste-to-energy committee and criticised the opposition for not participating. Given the reliance that this government is having on incineration, it was the best thing that the Opposition could have done. 

The committee could have lent itself to a pure rubber stamping exercise so that José Herrera could plod on with his firm conviction that no recycling should be allowed to happen on the island. To him, the solution is that of bringing in the ‘big burn’.

Then we have the squandering of EU cohesion funds. Disgustingly, the materials recovery facility in Marsascala was allowed to literally go up in flames. 

When pressed whether he will be reconstructing this facility and re-instating the investment carried out by EU funds, Herrera conveniently replied that this facility will be redeveloped in Għallis because Sant’ Antnin will close down to appease constituencies. 

Typical of Labour’s approach to accommodate diehard supporters, all of Malta’s waste will soon start to be trucked to Għallis in an effort by Herrera to literally put all his eggs in one basket increasing the risk of failure manifold.

Regardless of what Herrera thinks, all these failures and changes in waste management plans are in breach of the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive. But Herrera doesn’t care much about the air we breathe let alone about the environmental impact his plans and programmes will have upon us in future. 

In the past, waste management was a herculean task because of the mountain dump the country had to deal with. Today, the challenge is bigger because we have to deal with a mountain of incompetencies that breaches environmental regulations deliberately to line up the pockets of the few chosen ones.

Jason Azzopardi is an Opposition MP.