How Mrieħel was included among the high-rise towns was always a mystery. I had always smelled a rat. Now the whole dirty process has been revealed.

A few months after the Labour Party was elected, on November 25, 2013, a public consultation exercise on the Planning Policy Guide on the Use and Applicability of the Floor Area Ratio (FAR) was launched. This is the policy which specifies which zones may have high-rise buildings (those over 10 storeys) built upon them. The draft of the document presented for public consultation included the towns/areas of Paceville, Qawra, Tigné, Marsa, and Gżira only as appropriate areas for high-rise buildings. 

Michael Farrugia, left, and Yorgen Fenech

The public consultation period for such planning policy was closed on January 24, 2014.   

However, on May 24, 2014, the government sprang a surprise when it inserted a last- minute amendment in parliament to include Mrieħel too. The Planning Policy Guide on the Use and Applicability of the Floor Area Ratio (FAR) was thus approved with the inclusion of Mrieħel as an appropriate area for high-rise buildings.

This took everybody (apart from the dumb opposition that voted for the policy guide) by surprise. A month later, Planning Ombudsman David Pace decried the lack of public consultation on the inclusion of Mrieħel as a site for high-rise development, a site that had been included by stealth. “The inclusion of Mrieħel in the approved zones where the policy is applicable, should have been put to public consultation prior to the final approval by the Mepa board,” the planning ombudsman told Malta Today.

Such a decision proved to be a gold mine for Yorgen Fenech and his Gasan associates. In fact, on September 16, 2014, Tumas Gasan Holdings Ltd – the company belonging also to Fenech, that had been set up in 2001 – filed an application for four high-rise skyscrapers.

They asked to demolish the existing dilapidated structure, excavate the ground and construct a reservoir, a car park, a supermarket and a showroom. Their project was known as the ‘Quad Business Towers’ at Triq il-Mergħat c/w Triq L-Esportatur c/w, Triq L-Intornjatur, in Mrieħel.

What had happened to make the government have its last-minute change of heart to favour Fenech’s company?

These are the four towers that one can see going up in Mrieħel today.

What had happened to make the government have its last-minute change of heart to favour Fenech’s company?

In the following years, we came to find out that the prime mover behind this change was the then parliamentary secretary for planning, Michael Farrugia.

In fact, on March 5, 2014, a month-and-a-half after the closing date of the public consultation, Farrugia sent a letter to the CEO of the Planning Authority, Johann Buttigieg, the man who flies with developers to watch football matches and who flew in Jacqueline Gili on a private plane to vote in favour of the db project, requesting that the locality of Mrieħel be inserted in the policy as an appropriate one for high-rise buildings. 

This letter had never been made public at the time and the public had no idea that Mrieħel would be included in the policy.

Why did Farrugia intervene? What interest did he have to have Mrieħel included? Why did he do all things hush hush and did not inform the public immediately of his intentions?

The solution to this mystery has been solved last week, thanks to a Freedom of Information request filed by The Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation, requesting a list of the meetings Yorgen Fenech had in Castille.

And what emerges from this list?

That Fenech had a meeting with the then parliamentary secretary for planning, Farrugia, on Wednesday, March 5, 2014, between 9.27 and 9.53am.

And a few hours (or was it, a few minutes?) later, Farrugia addressed his famous letter to Johann Buttigieg asking him to “consider Mrieħel as an appropriate location for tall buildings”.

Amazing. In Maltese we have the perfect expression to describe all this: ‘Maħduma bizzilla’.

 What happened later in the year is well known to all: in December 2014, 12 weeks after having applied for the Quad Business Towers project,  Fenech gave a present to prime minister Joseph Muscat: a Bulgari watch estimated to cost some €20,000.

In hindsight, I can publicly state that Fenech must be a really stingy person. After having first having obtained the multimillion dirty Electrogas concession from Muscat and Konrad Mizzi in 2013 and then the other shady multimillion concession to have Mrieħel included among the appropriate locations for tall buildings, he should have gifted Muscat ‘Big Ben’ and not a measly €20,000.

The Permanent Commission against Corruption has been informed of all the above.

Arnold Cassola, former secretary general, European Greens