Motion splits local council

A motion urging the government to hold a consultation meeting with the residents on the proposed Qui-Si-Sana car park caused uproar at a meeting of the Sliema council meeting yesterday.

In his motion, councillor Michael Pace Rosso said "the council reiterates that it is in favour of the Qui-Si-Sana car park, which would help to alleviate the parking problem of Sliema residents".

But other councillors claimed this was a "lie" and that the council had reversed its previous position to one in favour of the car park.

Committee members of the Qui-Si-Sana Residents' Association agreed, saying it was, in fact, a "double U-turn".

The council was initially in favour of the project, then against and now in favour again, they said, adding that the council had voted unanimously to seek a meeting with the Prime Minister with a view to dropping the development brief altogether.

No meeting had been set up, so the council was resorting to the Office of the Ombudsman, they continued.

The committee members felt that the Nationalist Party councillors were being pressurised by the government on the project and commented that the issue had, unfortunately, always been based on party politics.

At the meeting, which highlighted the political division within the council, angry Labour and Alternattiva Demokratika councillors, as well as members of the residents' association, accused the six PN councillors of having met with Urban Development Minister Jesmond Mugliett "behind their backs" and had seen the plans for the whole Qui-Si-Sana, Tignè and The Strand project.

They claimed to have been left in the dark about all this and were not given access to this "privileged information".

The PN councillors insisted they had every right to meet whoever they wanted. They had learnt about the plans through a TV address by Mr Mugliett and had asked to see him to seek an explanation of the plan for the area, which had to be considered "holistically", they said.

The motion pointed out that the "misinformation" about the project was "shameful" and that what the residents were being told was not always true.

A proposal to write to the Malta Environment and Planning Authority to give the council all the information on the project it rightfully deserved, including a list of the environment reports carried out, plans and other related documentation, was defeated in a battle between the two sides.