The Palace car park project

Resources and Rural Affairs Minister George Pullicino (March 13) tried to justify his action on the proposed car park in St George's (Palace) Square, Valletta by distorting facts in my regard, accusing me of not only wanting one level but three! He has also made false accusations against the Cultural Heritage Advisory Committee.

The minister attacks me for wanting the car park (as if he did not want it!). It was always the policy of the Valletta Rehabilitation Project (VRP), as backed by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority, to reduce street parking. The fact that I backed VRP does not mean I wanted it personally and, in any case, having an underground car park does not mean I or VRP wanted to destroy the tunnels as these, together with other subterranean heritage in the square, which the ministry and the present VRP ignored, are just below the street level of the square. VRP had years ago suggested a different entrance to the proposed car park, which would have in no way destroyed this underground heritage.

The minister committed a very serious ethical mistake. When he became responsible for VRP he asked me to list all major pending projects and I did so, as I have always done, under the headings of "conservation projects" and "environment improvement projects". The car park was among VRP's pending projects. So what did I do wrong in giving him correct information?

The only time that he "consulted" me was when he sent for me, told me that the government would be building the car park as fast as possible and asked for my opinion. I wrote an e-mail the next day. These two reports were in no way written in an official capacity and, therefore, the minister has no right to discuss them in public even though I stand by what I wrote.

Furthermore, Mr Pullicino failed to say that in my article in The Times I had written that if the government insisted on the car park, though in principle I disagreed, then maybe they should consider making an extension of St John's Co-Cathedral museum there. My proposal was therefore subjective to the government's insistence and not the other way round.

The minister's statement that the Cultural Heritage Advisory Committee did not comment on the proposal is completely untrue. He states that "in the two instances that the Mepa application PA 2112/08 was seen by this advisory board (meeting 349 on July 29, 2008 and meeting 383 on November 10, 2008), the minutes just confirmed agreement with the memorandum set out by (the Integrated Heritage Management Unit) IHM".

As can be verified through Mepa's website and file, while it is true that in meeting 349 the committee backed the memo already prepared by IHM (whose representatives attend all CHAC meetings), in meeting 383 CHAC approved its own memo. I was in fact asked by CHAC to prepare a draft response to the application, which I did following discussions we had in our meetings.

In this memo, dated November 11, 2008 and approved by the CHAC on that same date, it is stated that the committee would prefer "if there is no underground car park" and then goes on to comment only "if the project goes ahead contrary to CHAC's recommendations". In its memo, the committee expressed concern "that not enough attention has been given to the possibility of archaeological finds". The memo also mentions other subterranean heritage that has not been researched and was ignored by VRP and the ministry.

The minister has very unjustly tried to taint my reputation as a conservationist. As everyone knows I dedicated 20 years of my life to Valletta. Mr Pullicino does not have the right credentials to judge my reputation but I will not repeat what everyone knows about his career. My record shows that I very strongly defended Valletta's subterranean heritage through such projects as doing away with wiring in the drainage tunnels, the restoration of major cisterns (in front of the law courts and St John's Co-Cathedral and others) and restored many tunnels and underground spaces. My reputation as a conservationist is confirmed not only through local but also international work especially by Unesco and various other organisations. I could not be a member of the ICCROM council, a member, for nine years, of the World Heritage Panel, president of the prestigious International Committee of Historic Towns, senior adviser to the Global Heritage Fund and much more if my record and reputation were not intact.

Over the years only two people staunchly defended Valletta's subterranean heritage with me in VRP. They were Miriam Cremona and Noel Galea Bason. For years we requested funding for the restoration of this heritage and were ignored.

My record cannot be tainted by the minister's statements to cover up for his shortcomings. Yes, we all knew about the underground passage, although we did not know its extent. He was warned to take all the necessary precautions. But if, as he said in his article, the ministry "was aware of the tunnel", then why did he propose that the entrance to the car park be through this area? Why did he not carry out investigations before he applied to Mepa in the first place?

The fact remains that the minister embarked on this project without making the proper necessary checks and changes as requested by the Heritage Advisory Committee, the Integrated Heritage Management Unit and the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage, three bodies that work in close collaboration.

The superficial investigations carried out before the application was made were nowhere near what had to be done in a project that deals with the main square of our capital city. That is the real truth about "what lies beneath" this project.