For the new university campus, the Nationalist Opposition and environmental groups have proposed the Enemalta fuel storage plant, which is being dismantled. Photo: CNES/Astrium, Digital Globe, Map Data ©2015 Google

Birżebbuġa would gain nothing if the proposed American university were sited at the former Enemalta fuel plant there, Labour mayor Kevin Barun said yesterday.

“I am personally against hosting this University in Birżebbuġa. We have nothing to gain from it. It will only benefit businessmen and not the residents. What we need are more open spaces here and not more buildings,” he said.

The Nationalist Opposition and environmental groups have proposed the fuel storage plant, which is being dismantled – about 40,000 square metres of prime land close to the shoreline – as an alternative to the Żonqor Point site suggested by the government.

The government has been harping on the economic regeneration of the south of the island through the €100 million American university investment. According to present plans, the university campus will cover an area of over 90,000 square metres of pristine agricultural land in Marsascala.

PN councillor Herman Schiavone moved a council motion last week for a feasibility study to be commissioned on the possibility of the project being housed in Birżebbuġa, but the five Labour councillors, including the major, voted against. Asked to explain, Mr Barun said they had no instructions from the Labour Party headquarters on what to do.

However, he said he felt that the “motion was too rigid and should not have focused on just a university. We must explore other possibilities.”

You already won’t find a place to rent in our locality. All we need is open spaces. I think they should build it in Marsascala

Mr Barun said his idea was to have recreational areas, not universities, in the space to be vacated by Enemalta.

When it was pointed out to him that the government was insisting on the project being sited in the south, because it would serve as an economic boost, Mr Barun said residents would not benefit in the same way.

“You already won’t find a place to rent out in our locality. All we need is open spaces. I think they should build [the university] in Marsascala,” he said.

Asked whether it would be better to house such a project in an area that had already been developed rather than use virgin land at Żonqor, Mr Barun disagreed.

“No one raised any questions when so many things were located in Birżebbuġa. Not even when dredging permits were given with very bad consequences to residents. Now we need open spaces not buildings,” he insisted.

Dr Schiavone said the project would be ideal for the locality and its residents.

“Putting this university here in an area which is already developed makes much more sense than ruining large tracts of land. After all we are also in the south,” he said.