Court awards €50,000 over rights violation in expropriation case

A court today ordered the Commissioner of Lands to pay €50,000 as compensation to a Sliema family after finding that their human rights were violated following the expropriation of a property in Parisio Street in 1991.

The owners told the court that the property had never been used by the government and had been allowed to deteriorate. They claimed a violation of their right to enjoyment of their property and their right to compensation, adding that they had never received any offer of payment from the government.

Mr Justice Tonio Mallia found that no project or plan for the property had existed, although the Commissioner of Land told the court that there was a plan to, at some time, to build a road through the site.

While the government was entitled to decide which projects to implement in the public interest, it was also true that it was not right that the owners of the Sliema property had been left in a state of uncertainty about their property for 16 years.

The court ordered the release of the premises in favour of the owners. But since the property (valued at €640,577.68, had sustained damages and the owners had been precluded from making use of it for 16 years, the court awarded the owners compensation of €50,000.