Five missed deadlines and ...
| Headlines maltastar.com |
| Five missed deadlines and three cost quotations | ||||||
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The Nationalist Government has, on different occasions, given five different completion dates and three different cost quotations for the North of Malta and Gozo sewage treatment plants.
Ministers Ninu Zammit, Giovanna Debono and Austin Gatt have, separately, indicated the end of 2005, the end of 2006, early 2007, mid-2007 and mid-August 2007 as the completion date for the two sewage treatment plants. Likewise, the three ministers separetly have said that the Gozo sewage treatment plant should cost Lm 3.6 million, Lm 2.6 million and Lm 3.2 million. With regards to the North Malta sewage treatment plant, the different prices quoted were LM 5 million, LM 3.5 million and LM 2 million. At the moment neither the completion date nor the final cost of these sewage plants is known.
This was revealed in a hard hitting statement made by Labour’s chief whip and main spokesperson for infrastructural services, the Hon. Joe Mizzi MP, who said that the withdrawn resignation of Water Services Corporation (WSC) chairman, architect Michael Falzon, last week was nothing but a farce. Mr Mizzi said, “Instead of having the completion of the sewage plants as stated by mid-August we have had the mid-August farce of the tendered and withdrawn resignation of the WSC chairman.”
PM should publish full details .jpg) In his statement, Joe Mizzi said that the Prime Minister, Dr Lawrence Gonzi, who is also the minister for finance and, thereby, also doubly responsible for the people’s money should publish the full details setting out the reasons for these missed deadlines and the different cost quotations and cost overruns. Mr Mizzi said that the Prime Minister should publish all the cost overruns which were listed in Minister Austin Gatt’s letter to the chairman and board of the WSC on August 9, which led to Mr Falzon’s resignation.Mr Mizzi continued that the WSC should also publish a detailed explanation for these cost overruns. The Labour Chief Whip said that the Nationalist Government is treating the Maltese people as if they were imbeciles however, he added, the Maltese and Gozitan people have a right to know how their money is being spent. He added that this is yet another example which underlines both the Nationalist Government’s complete incompetence and inability to plan as well as its total lack of transparency and accountability.
Farce resignation Mr Mizzi insisted that architect Falzon’s resignation was a complete farce. He said that after receiving Minister Austin Gatt’s letter of August 9, Falzon had felt that he had to resign. Despite this, after a conciliation meeting between the two was hastily set up Falzon declared that he was ready to continue serving as chairman while Minister Gatt, uncharacteristically, made a u-turn and said that he was satisfied that the position of the WSC Board was similar to his. Mr Mizzi said that this was simply a papering over of the cracks and a complete farce. He said that the people have a right to know why Mr Falzon really resigned and why Minister Gatt backtracked.
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