Prime Minister Gonzi and Emperor Nero

Lawrence Gonzi will go down in the annals of Maltese history as the prime minister who had a chance to restore the entrance to Valletta to its former glory but who instead stood at the top of Castille, watching while the total uglification of a once magnificent Baroque city was completed.

Isn't it bad enough that the Nationalist government of the 1960s will forever be remembered for lumbering us with that horrid garage door instead of the beautiful City Gate which so many of us still remember? I am not old enough to remember the magnificent Opera House building, but looking at the photos in The Times of March 15 and the miniature building of it by Carmelo Camilleri made me wonder how anyone in his right mind could possibly sanction the building of anything else on this site.

Dr Gonzi was a gentleman who always listened but now it seems he is too busy to do anything but stick his head in the sand and not look while the destruction of the entrance to Valletta takes place - just like Emperor Nero did while Rome was burning.

We didn't need to waste so much money paying Renzo Piano for designs to our beautiful city when, with all due respect to him, he is well known all over the world for building nothing but hideous, modern monstrosities. If anyone in his right mind could possibly consider, even for one minute, building anything else to replace City Gate and the Opera House instead of what once graced the entrance to this magnificent city then he surely needs his head examined.

Also, before the Labour Party jumps on the bandwagon, I would like to say that if it had any feeling at all for what is due to Valletta, it had 16 whole years to do something about rebuilding the Opera House and removing that terrible entrance to Valletta which was an abomination right from the start.

Dear Prime Minister, you are still in time to reverse this wrong decision and it will not make you less of a man if you were to do so. Just remember that to err is human but to persist is diabolical.

Nobody is asking to have the Barry building as nothing but an opera house in this day and age, which is just not feasible, but the actual building itself, at least on the outside, should be a replica of the original and then the inside, as has been suggested ad nauseam, should be a multi-purpose building.

If you do not want to go down in history as being the one who disregarded the feelings of so many thousands of your countrymen then please put the building of a modern Parliament at the entrance of our beloved city out of your mind and place it in one of the many vacant places crying out for some loving care, and give our beautiful city the dignity it deserves.