Ta’ Qali Crafts Village has been dubbed a “ghost town” by the tourists it is meant to attract, while the head of the body tasked with overseeing its regeneration has admitted the project has become “a big mess”.

The attraction, where people can buy crafts and watch artisans at work, was slated to undergo a multi-million-euro transformation by the end of 2017 but remains unfinished six years later.

Under the regeneration plan, a government agency was to take responsibility for infrastructure while the tenants were to construct individual premises.

But the arrangement has led to a patchy situation whereby some buildings are complete, others have been left looking like construction sites and others have changed hands amid a now-restricted practice.

The government has now taken over the construction of 16 of the remaining 25 plots.

When Times of Malta visited the site this month, the streets were deserted, pavements surrounded by barriers and some buildings left abandoned. 

Tourists appeared bemused as they walked around the village.

“There’s a lot of construction and not a lot of shops open,” said French holidaymaker Tidiane Roumeas. 

Shona Harrington from Yorkshire called the village “a bit of a ghost town”, while French tourist Marc Oddon remarked that it was not easy to tell if shops were open or not.

Jenny Bass, a tourist from the UK, said she had been surprised by the lack of footfall in the area.

“I did expect a few more places open because it’s the summer holidays,” she said.

Business owners told Times of Malta they have complained about a lack of progress, despite being told the village would be completed “by the end of the year” numerous times by government ministers over the last six years.

‘Please give us a deadline’

Bristow Potteries director Mark Grima, whose premises are finished, complained about the low number of tourists.

“We get people here who tell us, ‘We don’t want to come again’… they call this place a warzone [and] it hurts us,” he said.

“Please, give us a deadline and let’s make it happen. We want to see progress.”

Mediterranean Ceramics co-owner David Grima called the various revisions to the project’s completion date over the years “frustrating and disappointing”.

“We’ve lost footfall... if we’d have remained as we were, we’d be doing okay,” he said, adding tour operators had told him they were unwilling to organise trips to the village while construction works are still going on.

One shop owner whose plot is still being built is Heritage Homes of Malta. Managing director Joseph Galea blamed building requirements for the delays.

“The big problem is we were required to use Maltese stone... nobody wants to do it and it’s laborious... construction workers who work with it are rare,” he said, adding the material was expensive and in short supply.

Although he says that the outstanding sites now managed by the government are taking “too long” to complete, Galea admits that responsibility for the crafts village not being finished is mainly the fault of tenants who have not completed their properties on time.

Other operators also complained about a shortage of builders, while one who asked not to be named claimed that some tenants had taken the land - given to them for free - speculatively, with the intention of selling it on.

Broken promises

Following decades of failed bids to give the old crafts village a facelift, the latest raft of development to the site began in 2017 when former economy minister Chris Cardona announced the government would invest €10 million of EU funds into the project.

Despite initially pledging that works would be completed by the end of the year, Cardona later set the completion date for 2018.

However, by 2019, officials met with journalists to announce that some €13 million was dedicated to the project and that operators were offered up to €70,000 to build new facilities in the village.

The public was told the works were due to be finished by the end of 2020.

By 2021, it was the turn of Cardona’s successor, Economy Minister Silvio Schembri, to visit the site and announce the works would be completed by the end of the year.

More than two years later, operators at the site are still waiting for the village to be completed.

INDIS is hopeful

According to the government’s industrial land management company, INDIS, 25 plots are now fully operational with a further 14 finished but not yet open for business.

Jean Pierre Attard, executive chairman of INDIS, said that while infrastructure works on the site have been completed, the government has been forced to take over the construction of 16 of the remaining 25 plots and is engaged in legal action against a further nine tenants.

“Everyone wants to complete it... it’s a big mess, but we’ll make it,” he said.

Confirming allegations of speculative land grabbing by some tenants, he admitted this had happened “a lot”, with some plots having changed hands several times. For the last two years, however, no transfers had been allowed, he said.

With legal action against nine tenants liable to extend past next year, Attard said INDIS would consider different measures to minimise the unsightly appearance of the outstanding plots once works to existing sites have been completed.

Attard acknowledged a lack of local builders able to work with Maltese stone.

“If they get better offers from the private sector, they go to them,” he said, adding the price rises seen for construction materials in recent years had made the original agreements less attractive to contractors today.

While the agency was able to enter into new agreements reflecting up-to-date prices, this was ultimately down to the tenants in question, who are obliged to repay INDIS for its investment following their sites’ completion, he said.

Responding to concerns from businesses about being unable to attract visitors to the site while construction work was ongoing, he admitted this was an issue, calling it “a dilemma, even for us”.

However, he remains hopeful that the saga is nearing an end.

“My dream is to open by December next year,” he said.