The abandoned Jerma hotel in Marsascala remains a den of abuse and filth, 10 months after the authorities started the process to have it knocked down.
The case is pending in front of the Environment and Planning Review Tribunal after the owners contested an enforcement order issued by the Planning Authority in August last year.
However, from the testimony in the case it transpires that the authority was only seeking a method statement from the site owners, stating how they planned to address the danger posed by the abandoned structure.
The planning officers who testified did not specify what they were expecting the owners to do, despite the fanfare last year that the authority had finally initiated the process to force the owners to demolish the building.
The enforcement order was issued on the grounds that the derelict structure presented a danger.
According to the planning officer’s testimony, a site inspection revealed people camping on the hotel grounds and a makeshift track for radio control cars in what was once a restaurant. The site was also littered with waste.
Another sitting of the tribunal was held last Thursday but the documentation had not yet been put online by the time of writing. The Jerma site is owned by JPM Brothers Ltd and Jefpet Ltd, in turn owned by brothers Jeffrey and Peter Montebello.
A planning application to develop a hotel and luxury apartments on the Jerma site was filed in 2008, a year after the hotel closed its doors to business.
But the brothers dropped the plans after running into financial troubles.
An attempt to sell the hotel site by court auction in October last year was unsuccessful after HSBC, which asked for the sale, called on the court to postpone the process since it wanted to re-evaluate the situation.
A court expert had valued the former hotel and its surrounding land at €20.8 million. It would cost €1.5 million to demolish the building.
The Jerma Palace Hotel and its surrounding land covers an area of 38,745 square metres – almost the size of five-and-a-half football pitches.
In September, Porto Notos Ltd, a company owned by Charles Camilleri, known as ‘il-Franċiż’, and lawyer Pierre Lofaro filed a planning application for the construction of three towers on the Jerma peninsula.
They did so with the consent of the site owners. However, the Planning Authority publicly said the construction of high-rise buildings and the reclamation of land from the sea were non-starters.
In a meeting held with the Marsascala mayor earlier this month, the developers said they were ready to change their plans, proposing either a single 28-storey tower or more density on the existing footprint.
The Jerma Palace Hotel was Malta’s most prestigious hotel in the south. Then the biggest in Malta with 700 beds, it was opened in 1982. It had taken three years to build and cost €16.3 million. Until it closed it was operated by the Corinthia chain.