The Valletta monti relocation has taken another twist, as hawkers are claiming that the Economy Ministry has not adhered to a 2014 agreement which specified an alternate site for their stalls.

Though the Labour Party committed itself to relocate the monti to Ordnance Street on the eve of the last general election, the existence of this separate agreement only came to light yesterday.

Though she would not reveal this location, the hawkers’ legal representative Claire Bonello yesterday told the Times of Malta that any further delays from the ministry to implement this agreement would spell trouble for the government – but did not elaborate further.

The lawyer was reacting to an Economy Ministry statement which said that a meeting with the 74 licensed hawkers scheduled for yesterday had been called off as only four of them turned up, accompanied by their legal representative.

It added that the meeting was crucial due to the fact that works on the rehabilitation of the Old Market (Is-Suq tal-Belt), adjacent to the present monti site in Merchants Street were due to start. It added that the government postponed the meeting to safeguard the interests of all stakeholders.

Hawkers were very keen to find a solution

Dr Bonello complained that not all of her clients had been notified about the meeting. Nevertheless, she argued that the monti hawkers’ committee statute authorised her to represent them for such meetings. She added that contrary to the ministry’s claims, hawkers were very keen to find a solution, to the point that yesterday’s meeting was only scheduled after she had personally chased Economy Minister Chris Cardona.

As for the 2014 agreement, she said that this had been signed individually with each and every hawker and even included a map marking the exact location of every stall.

Asked for his reaction, Dr Cardona requested a copy of this agreement (which this newspaper has not seen) to be in a position to examine their claim. Pressed further, he said he would wait to pronounce himself until meeting all hawkers personally.

“This is not a trade union issue but concerns individual hawkers. So it is not a question of meeting their representatives but every one of them. We have to conclude this saga maturely,” he said.

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.