Minister de Marco’s flagrant refusal to shoulder political responsibility for Mepa will not go away simply by his dismissing lightly our public call to do so.
Neither will such an issue be glossed over by being completely ignored by the de Marco friendly media (am not referring to your newspaper), as it has been from the moment we went public on the issue.
While the Tourism & Environment Ministry deemed it fit to comment about certain positive aspects touched upon by the Mepa Auditor, it seems to have ignored completely the following factors:
that time and time again Joe Falzon was publicly rapped by both the Prime Minister and Mepa’s serving executive chairman as well as by columnists very close to the corridors of power.
that in Mepa’s initial reaction to the PL statement on Mepa complicity in the Mercaptan saga, it lamented that the report compiled by the auditor was never presented to Mepa for its comments and was published without it having the opportunity to provide further information to the auditor
that in his Mercaptan investigation Mr Falzon passed the following remarks:
a) that although the CPD had claimed to have solved this problem, Mepa never submitted any requests for explanations to obtain the necessary details on how the situation was actually solved. In fact, when the questions of Mepa were left unanswered, Mepa seemed to be even perfectly happy so much so that the whole case was closed.
b) Mepa kept no records of its informal meetings with Enemalta on the Mercaptan saga
c) that although Mepa had been considering taking legal action against Enemalta on this issue, it failed to do so without giving any reasons why it did not pursue the matter further
d) that when various requests to Enemalta by Mepa went unanswered, Mepa in the auditor’s own words took no further action on the matter.
e) Even worse, according to the Auditor – the Director, Environment Protection was requested to inform the Audit Office whether Mepa had taken any further action, but no additional information was given.
Although the Auditor understandably claimed that Enemalta was primarily and directly responsible for the situation as it evolved, however, according to him ‘Mepa cannot be held blameless in the circumstances’.
What should have worried all parties concerned, Mepa included, is that the events became public (according to the Auditor) only because the material concerned smelt so foul that all the precautions taken by Enemalta to try to conceal what was happening were of no avail and a chance journalist decided to investigate.
Although the ministry concluded that Mepa was adopting zero tolerance to environmental damage and that Mepa was not being lenient with government departments, our conclusion to the alone as a party, but the conclusion of the Auditor himself.
At one stage he even remarked as follows:
“Mepa should therefore adopt a policy of zero tolerance with respect to environmental damage. The full powers given to Mepa by the law should be used against those people, including government corporations, who break the law. I would also recommend that such events be given full publicity as such publicity is an additional deterrent… Mepa should NOT hesitate to prosecute offenders, even if these are government bodies.”
If the Minister finds all these words comforting, I definitely do not.
Both the Minister and Mepa itself have remained silent in spite of the Authority having a new CEO in place since the summer of 2011 and they are still effectively lumped with two handsomely paid CEOs – an Executive Chairman and a CEO when the transition should have long taken place and been concluded. As things stand, the chairman can, according to the Auditor, even play an executive role in the decision-making process, particularly when controversial issues are at stake.
It is interesting to note that in his references to the Auditor’s findings, the Minister never found time to comment on the said Auditor’s findings of last year on the appointment of certain key officials within Mepa itself.
In his findings, the Mepa auditor had fundamentally disagreed with the chairman’s statement that everything had been done according to law, particularly since Mepa is not a private company but a corporation established by law.
In one particular case, the selection process was completed and the person appointed before the authorisation from the ETC was obtained.
The ETC had never, in any way, even considered whether the request by Mepa to consider the post in question as a post of special trust could be justified.
The Auditor took great exception to the fact that one should not have a carte blanche to handpick people for posts, as Mepa did in recent months.
Your readers might also be interested in knowing about another conclusion reached by the Auditor in his final comments that when the Office of the Ombudsman requested a definition of the term ‘position of special trust’ from the Office of the Prime Minister, this was not forthcoming.
In the case of Mepa, the Director, Environment Protection has specific duties established by law that he cannot delegate to another person, or be delegated to another person even by a Board’s decision.
The chairman failed completely to justify his actions when he stated that he felt the selection of a suitable person to fill the post in question may be difficult and time consuming and he opted for a head hunting exercise, which is regularly used in private industry… But in a private company the CEO is responsible to the Board, which in practice means the owners or shareholders, while Mepa is a public corporation where the interests of all citizens must be protected.
In the light of all these flagrant Mepa shortcomings, which go far beyond the MERCAPTAN saga, the Minister must decide whether he will accept full political responsibility, as Mepa does not even seem to have shouldered its own administrative responsibilities for these definite negatives.
In the absence of any reaction from the Minister, we will have to reach our own conclusions as to whether he happens to be more interested in protecting the environment or his own government’s political appointees or vice-versa.
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Leo Brincat is the shadow minister for the environment, sustainable development and climate change