Your article entitled “EPP protests re-opening of Ramla l-Hamra petition” (MaltaToday, 9 November) gives the false impression, notably through its title, that my political group does not oppose the Ramla development because it did not agree to the re-opening of the petition on Ramla l-Hamra.
In fact this is not true at all since the petition was merely closed because there is no authorised development at Ramla in the first place. Moreover, I have already publicly expressed my opposition to this development.
Regrettably, the article blindly relies on a Green MEP as a source of its information and in the event ends up turning political propaganda into news. Little surprise therefore, that it transmits a false impression.
The facts as they happened are the following:
Firstly, during a meeting of the Petitions Committee on Thursday 6 November, MEPs were informed by the Chairman that, on the request of the Green group, the co-ordinators meeting to prepare the work of the committee had decided to re-open a Maltese petition. It was not clear at that stage whether this announcement related to the petition on the Sant’ Antnin plant or the Ramla l-Hamra development, both of which were closed last month.
Secondly, on a point of order I enquired into this matter and insisted that it was highly inappropriate for a Committee decision to close a petition to be overturned in this manner. I argued that if a petition were closed by the Committee, then it should only be re-opened by the Committee itself and not through the backdoor. My intervention was supported by another EPP MEP, who insisted that the petition in question remain closed until proper evidence was brought on why it should be re-opened. On this basis the petition remained closed.
Regrettably, the Green/Alternattiva propaganda has recently gone into overdrive to manipulate the Petitions’ Committee on the Ramla l-Hamra issue, and I cannot agree with this. Their petition on Ramla l-Hamra was closed for the simple reason that no permit for this development exists. The fact that an appeal (by the developer and not by the authorities) appears to be currently underway does not change the fact that no development is currently authoritised. And as long as no development is authoritised I see no reason why we should re-open this petition.
Except for one. Alternattiva would no doubt like to keep its petition open for its own political ends. But you would understand that this can hardly be a good enough reason.

Simon Busuttil MEP,
Brussels

PRINT THIS ARTICLE