The Qui-si-Sana Residents Association wishes to publicly protest against the waiving of an Environment Impact Assessment for the Fort Cambridge Project.

Maltese law states that an EIA has to be commissioned for projects of more than 300 units. This, in addition to the acceptance of the Project Description Statement as a substitute, is a blatant violation of EU law as it was not made available to the relevant EU authorities, nor was the required EU clearance obtained.

As pointed out by members of the MEPA Board, the Project Description Statement was inadequate in several respects and therefore, in the association’s opinion, it did not contain sufficient information to allow a sound decision to be taken.

The association feels it is a conflict of interest to allow the architect responsible for the design of the Fort Cambridge project to author the Project Description Statement. Furthermore, the author of the Traffic Impact Statement is apparently not qualified to carry out traffic studies.

The association also notes with concern that:

1.The tender for the project was altered substantially after it was awarded.

2. Substantial parts of the project contravene Section 97 of the Code of (Malta’s) Police Laws as was pointed out directly to the members of the MEPA Board.

3. Once again, the plans submitted are in major respects different to those presented to the public in the Development Brief.

This all brings into question the legality of the permission given to the project. Given that the EU is currently investigating the project's violation of regulations, one is surprised to see prominent financial institutions, which pride themselves on being leaders in Corporate Social Responsibility, participating in such a questionable undertaking.

The residents of Tigne and Qui-si-Sana have a right to an EIA enshrined in EU law. MEPA’s decision to grant permission constitutes a breach of residents’ rights and is directly contrary to the remit of MEPA as a guarantor of people’s quality of life.