Roads in Santa Maria Estate

I refer to the article concerning Santa Maria Estate (August 17).

I would like to state facts which have not been stated, as the reporter obtained the comments from one party and did not ask for our comments.

This has been a long dragged out issue going back to 1964 when the government agreed that Santa Maria Estate would be developed as a private residential estate, and before we started construction on any villas, we had to ensure that all roads had been formed with all services, water, electricity and drainage, all this was at the company's expense.

In the 1970s, the government at that time decided that we could not have a private estate, and that all roads should be opened to the public. We therefore had to remove the barrier at the entrance of the estate which meant that everybody had access and all the roads which had been formed and serviced were being damaged by the enormous traffic on the site, especially heavy vehicles which were using the roads to carry certain work for individual owners.

It was at that time that the company decided that once the government had taken this line of action they should take over the maintenance of the roads. Several court cases were initiated and we had various complaints from owners on the issue, therefore the company in the 1980s decided once again to re-surface the main road which goes through the entire estate, together with certain side roads which covered almost 50 per cent of the roads. Once these were completed we advised the Public Works Department who agreed that the work carried out was to their complete satisfaction, and from that date they would be responsible for the maintenance of the roads. We insisted that an agreement should be made for the transfer of their responsibility. This agreement was never made, it is still pending today. The company decided not to continue with the re-surfacing of the remainder of the roads unless the government fulfilled its obligation. In 1997 the Mellieha local council filed a law suit against the company and the Court of Appeal remarked that the roads do not become public because they are accessible to the public, and gave the company a stipulated period to re-surface the remaining roads.

In the meantime, the company filed other law suits and insisted that the roads are government responsibility. The court decided on October 16, 2006 that the government should take over the full responsibility of all the roads in Santa Maria Estate and allowed them three months to do so. The government appealed and the court case is now in front of the Court of Appeal. In the previous court cases which the company lost, the court had appointed an architect who estimated that the cost involved was in the region of Lm400,000.

The company had two options, either to continue with the pending court case or to re-surface the remaining roads according to the previous court case.

It is important to make it clear that during all these years since the 1970s, the company had written to all ministers concerned responsible for roads explaining this issue, in the hope that an agreement could be reached. It seems nobody ever bothered to get involved.

It was only when Roads Minister Jesmond Mugliett took the responsibility that discussions and meetings started taking place in the hope that an agreement should be reached. It now seems due to the good offices of Minister Jesmond Mugliett that an agreement has been reached, and I hope an agreement will soon be signed.

Although the company had an option to continue with the court case, the company believes that the matter has been outstanding for a number of years, and in the interests of all concerned, the matter should be settled once and for all, and that is why we have agreed in principle especially due to the work put in by the minister and ADT.

The above shows that problems can take a long time to sort out unless one finds the person who is prepared to sort out the issue.