From Mr M. Falzon

The Leader of the Opposition, Dr Alfred Sant, made a speech last Sunday morning where he alluded to my performance as chairman of the Water Services Corporation (WSC).

He said that he had heard that I was friendly with two construction companies in particular and that these had taken the lion’s share of contracts awarded by the WSC.

I write to provide readers with hard facts in response to the allusions, suggestions and hearsay that are Alfred Sant’s stock-in-trade.

In 1996, the year I left Parliament and politics, I resumed my practice. As an architect one deals constantly with construction companies and occasionally take part in a building development they are constructing. I have done this too on a number of occasions, even after being appointed chairman of the WSC since this is a part-time and non-executive role. In February 2002 a company I own, together with three other companies, invested in a piece of land for development to build a number of residential units.

Subsequently, all four companies became shareholders in a second company set up to carry out further development projects. One of those four companies is a Polidano Group company, which group also provides services to the WSC, but – and this is the part that Alfred Sant conveniently forgot to mention – only when the price quoted for those services is the lowest acceptable offer as determined by the appropriate selection board. Not because, as Alfred Sant mused, the contractor knew the architect.

The work for the Mellieha sewage treatment plant was awarded to the IBI-Polidano consortium on 19 November 2004 after invitations for tenders were issued to a number of Italian companies, including IBI, on 30 May 2004. The process for the award of the tender was transparent and I was not involved in it. The Selection Board’s conclusion was reached without any input from myself, as the members of the board can attest.

Last Sunday, Dr Sant alleged that Polidano Bros has been awarded the majority of WSC contracts. In fact, from 2000 to date the value of contracts awarded by WSC to the Polidano Group (excluding the Mellieha sewage treatment plant being paid by Italian protocol funds) were less than three per cent of the total value of WSC contracts.

I have no connection with the Maltese contractor in the consortium that was awarded the contract for the Gozo sewage treatment plant.

This is the truth, backed by facts and my willingness to disclose them. The rest is merely tar dripping from Alfred Sant’s brush.

Michael Falzon

NAXXAR