The preliminary site-selection exercise for the new university in the south will be tabled in Parliament on Monday, Mepa has said.

The planning authority was answering a request by this newspaper for a copy of the report that led the office of CEO Johann Buttigieg to select land in an outside development zone at Żonqor Point, Marsascala, for the new university in the south.

The request for the report was made under the Aarhus Convention, which gives the public the right to information on environmental issues.

Mepa is the authority tasked with ensuring that right is respected. The law states that if the information is available, it should be provided immediately or, at the latest, within 30 days.

Further to your article, the report pertaining to the site-selection exercise will be tabled Monday

A week ago, this newspaper wrote to Mepa chairman Vince Cassar, who is also the authority’s environment director, citing the obligations of the Aarhus Convention. No reply was received until Times of Malta published an article last Thursday saying that the request had been made.

The following morning Mepa replied: “Further to your article in today’s Times of Malta we are advised that the report pertaining to the preliminary site selection exercise for the American University will be tabled in Parliament next Monday.”

The Nationalist Party spokesman for planning, Ryan Callus, who is also a Mepa board member, asked for the document through a parliamentary question.

Mepa’s first reply to Times of Malta’s request was: “Your request for a copy of the report under the Aarhus Convention should follow the convention’s established procedures.” The law does not outline any procedure for requesting the information.

Times of Malta faced a similar situation when asking for the method statement on the “upgrading” of kiosks at the protected Għadira Bay, having to remind the authority not only of the obligations of the convention but the fact that it was the competent authority tasked to ensure its proper implementation.