Xemxija ridge will be looking very different in a few years’ time after the planning authority yesterday approved redevelopment of the old Mistra Village into a mega-project.

A total of 744 new apartments on 12 floors and thousands of square metres of retail and office space are planned for the area now occupied by the remains of what was once a low-rise holiday complex.

The project, to be developed by Gemxija Crown Ltd, is a multi-million euro investment by a Kuwaiti based company, Al Massaleh, in conjunction with JPM brothers – better known as the Montebello brothers – who have a minority shareholding.

Speaking to Times of Malta, Fahad Al-Khatrash, CEO of Al Massaleh, said his company was very satisfied that the project has been approved although he was cautious about going into specific details such as the commencement of works and the amount of money to be invested.

“We believe in this project and think that it will be an attraction to foreign investors particularly through the various schemes currently being launched”, he said. “We will however be assessing the market conditions first before we decide on how to proceed.”

Pressed to state when actual infrastructural works were scheduled to start, Mr Al-Khatrash said no date had yet been set as this all depended on the financing, negotiations with the banks and market conditions.

His company, he added, had noticed a turning point in the market, particularly for foreign buyers, and was fully committed to the project.

Sources close to the Kuwaiti investors told this newspaper that they had been following this project since 2008 when an outline development permit was issued by Mepa.

The Kuwaitis are already known on the island as they introduced Fimbank in Malta.

The Mistra Village was largely demolished a few years ago but the area has been a wasteland since then.

Environmental lobby groups and the St Paul’s Bay local council gave the application a rough ride yesterday, objecting to the development due to its “high environmental impact”, particularly visually and because of the traffic it is expected to generate.

A compromise solution proposed by the Nationalist Party’s representative on the board Ryan Callus – to rescale the development down and better align it to height limitations in the area – was defeated by 9 votes against 5.

Chairman Vince Cassar voted against the proposal and in favour of the project as presented by the developers, together with the majority of board members.

During the hearing, the developers said they had already scaled down their original designs by some 20 per cent, reducing the number of apartments by more than 200 units and limiting the height to 12 floors instead of the 15 originally proposed.

However, the re-design did not convince the main objectors, particularly Din l-Art Ħelwa and Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar, who described the project as “a monstrous high-rise building on a ridge”.

They said the development goes against Mepa’s own policy that no high-rise buildings should be permitted on ridges and criticised the granting of the outside development permit back in 2008.

Before the start of the hearing, the chairman turned down a request by Din l-Art Ħelwa to revoke the 2008 permit under an article in the Environment and Development Act.

Despite vociferous objections, Mr Cassar said that there was “no legal basis” for such a decision.