How much more do taxpayers need to pay for the Ta' Qali grass, asks PN
Prime Minister 'cast Jason Micallef aside' but made no apology
The Nationalist Party asked on Monday how much more taxpayers have to pay for grass to grow at the Ta'Qali picnic area after the prime minister revealed that a consultant has been hired to tackle the issue.
The picnic area grass has been in the headlines since the autumn, after a layer of gravel was laid over the site, effectively preventing growth.
Jason Micallef, a Labour Party official who is also responsible for the Ta' Qali park, had promised that the grass would sprout by mid-December, which has not happened.
On Sunday the prime minister said grass was now not expected to grow until a technical intervention, and a local expert had been engaged to tackle the problem.
It was revealed in parliament late last year that the gravel was laid after a direct order of over €311,000.
"After the Ta’ Qali gravel fiasco, the people will have to dig deeper into their pockets for grass to grow again," the PN said on Monday.
"After months of assuring the public that the project would succeed, with promise after promise, month after month, that the situation would improve, Abela yesterday admitted in an interview on Super One with LovinMalta that the project has failed," it added.
The prime minister, however, did not say how much additional public money would now be spent on expert advice, after having to engage yet another consultant to resolve this mess, the PN said. Nor did he comment on the fact that the gravel covering was awarded through a direct order to a contractor very close to him, without any public call for tenders, without any environmental impact studies, and without the necessary environmental permits being obtained, the party added.
Jason Micallef's attacks
It observed that Jason Micallef was quick to retaliate with further attacks on a number of people as he was 'cast aside' by the prime minister.
He launched an attack on Times of Malta, which had interviewed him on site, and in a social media post specifically targeting editor-in-chief Herman Grech. In a separate post, he again attacked podcaster Trudy Kerr, whom he had already aggressively targeted when this saga first erupted, calling her a “failed podcaster”.
These attacks followed a personal attack in mid-December on a journalist from Newsbook Malta and on her brother, the spokesperson for the President of Malta.
The PN observed that Robert Abela never apologised for Jason Micallef’s behaviour or condemned those attacks. In doing so, he endorsed Labour’s style of attacking anyone who disagreed with it, including the media that asked questions to hold it accountable for its actions.