ADPD - The Green Party said that the Labour Party and the Nationalist Party "cannot rewrite history" over Manoel Island, saying that both parties were directly responsible for the privatisation of the site in 2000 despite now welcoming the agreement returning the island to public ownership

ADPD Deputy Chairperson Carmel Cacopardo said that "Manoel Island was handed over to private developers through a parliamentary resolution approved unanimously by both PL and PN in January 2000, with the emphyteutical deed signed on 15 June 2000."

He said that both parties were accomplices in the privatisation of one of Malta's most strategic public spaces.

Cacopardo added that on Wednesday, Prime Minister Robert Abela wanted to present himself as the political leader who "gave Manoel Island back to the people."

"The reality is different. This is not the result of principle or environmental conviction. It is the result of political convenience and a shift in public opinion which made the overdevelopment of Manoel Island increasingly unpopular. It is also a result of the tireless work of volunteers who led a campaign on the issue," Cacopardo said.

"For years, ADPD consistently argued that Manoel Island should become a public park and green lung in the middle of one of the most densely populated urban areas in the country. While PL and PN parties defended speculative development, the Greens have repeatedly insisted that the public interest must come first," he added.

ADPD Chairperson Sandra Gauci said that Wednesday's positive news does not erase decades of destructive planning policies.

"While Manoel Island may now be politically useful as a symbol, overdevelopment continues elsewhere unchecked. Open spaces continue disappearing under concrete. Communities continue suffocating under uncontrolled construction and speculation," Gauci said.

She said that the situation on Manoel Island itself already reflects the failures of Malta's laissez-faire planning system.

Gauci said that illegal padel courts and commercial encroachment, are symptomatic of an authority that too often bends to private interests instead of protecting the common good.

She said that the application for land reclamation for a lido a few hundred metres from Manoel Island is another example of private interests trying their luck once again.

"Gżira remains one of the clearest examples of planning failure in Malta: a locality crushed by overdevelopment, traffic, loss of public space and the steady deterioration of residents' quality of life," Gauci said.

Gauci said that Abela, himself a former planning authority lawyer who "constantly defended the indefensible against the common good," cannot continue sacrificing public spaces to speculative interests and then expect applause when partially reversing decisions he and his party enabled.