Almost 30 years after losing her sister in a car crash, Rita Briffa is fighting to stop a small memorial of the tragedy being removed from the fatal spot in Attard.

The small stone marker, on which a marble plaque is mounted, stands at the edge of the pavement opposite the speed camera in Triq in-Nutar Zarb. Residents insist it presents a dangerous obstacle to pedestrians and want it removed but the family are adamant that it should remain there in memory of Sylvia Borg, who died in a car accident on December 30, 1981.

Over the years, the memorial, put up a month after Ms Borg died, has been removed three times and has also been broken. Each time it was replaced.

"Someone removed it recently and took it to the local council. We didn't know it was there and only found it when we went to complain after reporting it to the police. It was in the courtyard - not even the mayor knew it was there - and we took it back," Mrs Briffa said.

"We are really hurt - there is no respect. It's not the first time we found full garbage bags piled on top of it."

Only 25, Ms Borg was a passenger in a car driven by her then fiancé, Paul Mifsud, a former snooker and billiards amateur world champion, when it smashed into a tree.

Mr Mifsud survived but it took rescuers several hours to pull him out of the wreck and he was in critical condition for several days before recovering.

The memorial is embedded between an electricity pole and a bus stop. The family had not applied for a planning authority permit when they put it up because at that time there was no need to.

Mrs Briffa and her family are from Żebbuġ and drive past it every day on their way home. "We always look out for it - we want it there."

But they are facing great opposition from residents who feel it presents a hazard.

Charles Grech, the owner of a house that lies just behind the memorial, said it was an obstruction and he has been campaigning for many years to have it removed.

"I want to develop part of my property and the plaque will eventually obstruct the driveway - it has to go," he said.

Mr Grech has filed several reports with the police and the local council but has been shuttled from one authority to the other. "It has been there for over 20 years - it is illegal. Many people have fallen over it. Recently, a woman almost tripped over it when she got off the bus."

But Mrs Briffa does not agree. "She was with her fiancé and the car smashed into a tree and she died. There is a lot of emotion involved and after almost 30 years they decided that they want to remove it - if it's been there for so long why do they want to do that?" she queried.

Mrs Briffa's family had filed an application with the planning authority to get it sanctioned. But the application was refused on grounds that it causes an obstruction and is "alien" in the area's context.

But the family have not yet given up and last month filed a request for Mepa to reconsider.

"It is a great act of vandalism - there is no respect for what happened. My sister died there... " Mrs Briffa said.