I would like to address this letter of disgust to our minister of the environment. I am a citizen who, like many others young and old, enjoys my daily exercise. Usually I walk along the Sliema front but due to the heavy traffic and congestions nowadays, one cannot help but inhale more car fumes than fresh air. For this reason, I thought I would change my route to a healthier one.

I decided to walk along our coast road, between Bahar ic-Caghaq and the Coastline Hotel. I started on my journey but barely got half-way when I suddenly came across "Malta`s Alps", as I like to call them, or as many other people know it, Maghtab.

The only difference is that these are Alps of smouldering, stinking waste. I tried to walk past the area but could barely breathe due to the intense fog and fumes in the air, not to mention the couple of rats I met along the way too. Without a doubt I realised I had to turn back fearing that if I did not I would have been sick on the spot or caused some kind of harm to myself.

I think it is disgraceful that after all these years and many complaints, a country of Malta`s size still has not found a solution to this mess and visible changes are yet to be seen. Also it is an utter shame that a coastline as beautiful as this one is being ruined and polluted so severely.

I challenge the minister to take a stroll along this beautiful coast, without an oxygen mask, and inhale a few deep lungfuls of this "fresh air" of ours and tell me how he feels!