A Freedom of Information (FOI) request has been filed by Moviment Graffitti to the Planning Authority’s (PA) FOI Officer “demanding access” to all electronic communication between the PA’s CEO Martin Saliba, all members of its Executive Council, and Gozitan developer Joseph Portelli.

Moviment Graffitti in a statement on Friday, said that it filed the FOI request following what it said was “yet another irregular decision taken by the Planning Commission in yet another instance of bending the rules to appease Portelli’s interests.”

The Planning Commission was set to decide on a massive application on the 9th February, featuring 73 apartments and 60 garages in Sannat’s Ta’ Cenc area, which was filed by Portelli and his associates, Mark Agius and Daniel Refalo, the organisation said.

It went on to say that “instead, the Planning Commission decided to ask for guidance from the PA’s Executive Council, a separate body within the PA which is not responsible for the processing of such applications.”

The next hearing is now scheduled for Tuesday, the 1st of March at noon.

Moviment Graffitti argued that Portelli and his associates “were, time and time again, allowed to bend the rules in favour of their monstrous projects.”

The organisation pointed out that ”in fact, the application in the Ta’ Cenc area passed on to the Executive Council following insistent requests from Portelli’s architect during the hearing on the 9th of February, special treatment given to a piecemeal application that is only one part of a wider, much larger complex consisting of 125 apartments.”

“In light of the Commission’s highly irregular decision and Portelli’s track record as a developer who proudly admitted to using politicians to speed up the processes facilitating his greed,” Moviment Graffitti said that it “believes it is high time the public gets to have access to all correspondence, meetings, emails and other exchanges between all members of the PA’s Executive Council and Portelli.”

Moviment Graffitti added that it has “repeatedly drawn attention towards the Executive Chairperson of the PA, Martin Saliba, in particular.”

The organisation stated that, “Saliba, who is widely known as the former chair of the Environment Planning Review Tribunal (EPRT), was exposed as having a massive conflict of interest when it was revealed he was also an employee at the PA whilst heading a tribunal that hears cases against the PA.”

It went on to say that, “the same Martin Saliba now heads the PA itself, an authority which has proven to be toothless against sharks like Portelli.”

It stressed the fact that “to begin with, the authority already failed to heed its own case officer’s advice for the first Portelli application in Ta’ Cenc, approving the permit in spite of a clear recommendation for refusal.”

Moviment Graffitti stated that “in yet another set of piecemeal applications in Sannat, the Planning Commission once more went against recommendations for refusal of its own case officers during the hearing of the third application connected to the same project, ignoring several policy breaches in favour of churning out yet another batch of hundreds of Portelli’s apartments.”

According to the organisation, “when Portelli conducted illegal excavation works in Qala’s ODZ, the PA failed to take action against a developer who had clearly breached planning laws. Also, no action seems to have been taken against extensive illegal works by Portelli right at the edge of the Ta’ Cenc cliffs, adjacent to his massive development in Sannat, and which is likely connected to the same project.”

“Apartments in this project are already being advertised as having `landscaped gardens,’ a worrying sign for the integrity of this ecologically sensitive site and public access to the Ta’ Cenc cliffs,” it said.

“Faced with overwhelming evidence which shows that the authorities have failed to safeguard our land by respecting their own planning policies,” Moviment Graffitti said that it “feels there is no further reason to doubt the only logical explanation: the PA takes its orders from people like Portelli, not from the people who it is supposed to protect.”

Moviment Graffitti concluded, “we’d love to see Saliba and the rest of the Executive Council prove us otherwise.”

Photo: Moviment Graffitti

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