On Thursday afternoon, 1 November, during CNI’s programme on Smash TV, I remarked that prime minister Dr Lawrence Gonzi and his minister Dr Austin Gatt, had lost for Malta the 10 tumoli of land at Qawra, worth around Lm20 million, which formerly belonged to Maltacom (when Maltacom still belonged to government), when Tecom Investments took over Maltacom’s shares.
I thus questioned Dr Gonzi’s “safe pair of hands” propaganda campaign undertaken by the PN’s “strategy group”, while at the same time Dr Gonzi has returned from Lisbon gloating over his success in getting one more seat in the EU’ s parliament of 750 seats!
That very same evening minister Dr Gatt, while replying to budget criticism of his ministry, was reported to have announced that the government has initiated legal action to recover land at Qawra currently held by the GO Group (formerly Maltacom). The government, he insisted, was not prepared to surrender any of its rights over this land. Dr Gatt’s comment confirms that the said 10 tumoli of land (worth around Lm20 million today) is still in GO Group’s hands and has not been returned to government despite Dr Gatt’s and the prime minister’s assurance that those 10 tumoli land at Qawra were to return to government since that land did not form part of the agreement with Tecom Investments. This assurance was given soon after the official agreement with Tecom Investments had been signed. GO Group has insisted that that land is legally theirs once they had taken over Maltacom’s shares.
Starting “legal proceedings”, as all those who have started some legal action in the past know only too well, is no guarantee that their “legal proceedings” will result in a favourable verdict.
Many a time such legal proceedings end up costing thousands of liri in legal costs in vain. Dr Gatt being a lawyer knows this, so he should have prevented this when signing the original agreement with Tecom Investments with much fanfare. Now Dr Gatt’s “legal proceedings” may easily end up, once again, as being “too little, too late”!
Eddy Privitera
Mosta