The Marsaxlokk local council has been inundated with complaints from residents due to Enemalta maintenance works that have been making life in the fishing village a nightmare.
In an e-mail to Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, Marsaxlokk mayor Horace Gauci last week urged the authorities to step in as the situation was getting out of hand.
"I don't know if we are just waiting for someone to get hurt, or even worse, but something needs to be done," the e-mail, forwarded to all the relevant authorities, reads.
In the message, Mr Gauci writes that in recent days, an elderly woman has fallen into an open culvert, heavy vehicles have pulled exposed electricity cables from buildings, left construction debris in their wake and ruined the tourist experience for those visiting the southern village.
The works, mostly being carried out by Enemalta on Triq l-Arżnell, have resulted in a number of pavements being damaged.
The council told us it wasn’t a good idea to protest, so it just didn’t happen
The works are mostly for laying new subterranean electricity cables.
In a statement, the local council informed residents that it would be fixing the paving in instalments, since legally it was prohibited from issuing direct orders for more than €5,000 at one go.
The situation has got so bad that residents tried to organise a protest march last week. Residents said the local council had informed them that although an application for a protest permit had been filed, the council had decided against allowing it at the eleventh hour.
“The council told us it wasn’t a good idea to protest, so it just didn’t happen. We don’t really want to make trouble, we just want things to improve,” the residents said.
Contacted on Wednesday, Mr Gauci told the Times of Malta that though he had written the e-mail several days ago, the situation persisted. “The works are ongoing and still causing an inconvenience. That said, we have seen some improvements: at least there are Transport Malta officials in the mornings, not the evenings, to oversee the works,” he said.