Speaking at St George’s Square in Valletta, Dr Mangion said the Connections project was another unfulfilled promise by the Nationalist government since it had done nothing about it for six whole years.

He explained that the project had been launched in April 1998 by the then Labour government and by June 1998 it had short-listed the three consortia to carry out the project.

After the 1998 election, Minister Francis Zammit Dimech had promised that the Nationalist government would continued with the project, Dr Mangion said.

He explained that in March 2002 the Nationalist newspaper Il-Mument had announced that the talks about the project were at an advanced stage, but eight months later, Dr Zammit Dimech had said in a reply to a parliamentary question that it was difficult to predict when these talks would end.

Dr Mangion said that after the last general election, the project Connections was not mentioned at all.

On the other hand, Minister Ninu Zammit in June 2003 had promised a facelift of St George’s Square - which was supposed to be the centre of the Connections project --something which has not taken place yet despite that more than a year has passed, he said.

Dr Mangion explained that the Lm30 million Connections project would have led to an underground tunnel across Valletta with exits in the areas facing Sliema and Cottonera respectively.

The tunnel would have transported people directly by boat from Cottonera and Sliema and passed through the tunnel to reach the centre of Valletta, thus reducing traffic congestion, he said.

St George’s Square would have been dug to sea level so as to allow the boats to reach the centre of the capital city, with passengers alighting from the boats and taking lifts to the top.

Dr Mangion said this was another in a series of major projects

bungled by the Nationalist government.

For instance, he said, it had been promised that the White Rocks project would have brought foreign investment with the building of a hotel and other facilities, but this has not materialised and the site is now neglected and falling into disrepair.

Another example mentioned by Dr Mangion was the Mater Dei Hospital, which was scheduled to open before the last general elections but is still bogged down, with millions of liri being pumped into it without a clear opening date in sight.

“This has become the nightmare of the Maltese people,” he said.

Moreover, Dr Mangion said, the new quays at Cirkewwa and Mgarr (Gozo) have also not been completed in spite of the considerable money spent on them. He said there are plans to downscale the project at Mgarr, which is strongly opposed by the Gozo tourism industry.

He also said that the economy in general is not doing well, with 1,400 jobs being lost between April 2003 and April this year, while number of jobs in the manufacturing sector between April and June 2004 have decreased by almost 1,000.

Moreover, in tourism, Dr Mangion said, the latest MHRA figures showed a decrease of six per cent in income and of two per cent in the occupancy rate of hotels.

Dr Mangion said that in view of all this, Labour is doing something about the matter and has launched a plan for economic and social regeneration for the country which includes concrete proposals.

On his part, shadow tourism minister Evarist Bartolo said it was shameful that this week the MHRA had to appeal once more to the government to give importance to the tourism sector.

He said that with the lack of major infrastructural projects as well as the prevailing general neglect of the country, the quality of tourists’ experience in Malta is being negatively affected.

[email protected]