NEWS | Sunday, 15 July 2007

MEPA Chairman turns to Ombudsman on Cacopardo case

By Gerald Fenech
MEPA Chairman Andrew Calleja has written to Ombudsman Joe Said Pullicino in an attempt to solve the impasse created at the authority’s Audit Office. The re-appointment of former Investigating Officer Carmel Cacopardo is still causing a stir, Malta Today can reveal.
In a letter, seen by MaltaToday, Calleja asks the Ombudsman to consider the contents of another letter sent to Minister George Pullicino describing the recent developments in the Cacopardo case.
Calleja has said the MEPA board appreciates the importance of the Auditor’s Office and refers to the re-appointment of Joe Falzon in this position. He made clear that the Auditor’s Office must be independent, requiring an adequate staff complement to handle all requests and complaints.
In the letter sent to Minister Pullicino, the board said that it “has become increasingly preoccupied with the public opinions that Perit Carmel Cacopardo has been expressing” and “it believes that this has rendered his position as Investigating Officer untenable”.
The MEPA board explains that the authority rejected Cacopardo’s application for the role of Director for Environment Protection for a third time in the first quarter of 2006, a turn of events which led the applicant to file a complaint with the Ombudsman. The complaint was turned down due to the false allegations of bias, made by the same Cacopardo.
The letter continues to outline Cacopardo’s conduct in writing several letters to newspapers heavily criticizing MEPA’s setup and also chairing a political meeting organized by Alternattiva Demokratika. It argues that with such actions, Cacopardo virtually ruled himself out of the running for such a sensitive post within the authority and has made any future at MEPA untenable.