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I cannot understand why Wasteserv and the minister for environment find it so hard to give Marsaskala residents a guarantee that the new plant in our locality will not process more than 71,000 tonnes of waste.
Why is it so hard to give us this guarantee dear minister?
If you want to take us residents into your confidence and convince us of your good intentions, you must realise that a guarantee is of absolute necessity.
Marsaskala residents have been cheated already once. We cannot trust government or any public agency to deliver on its promise that the new plant at Sant Antnin will be professionally run and will only treat the stated amount of waste. As residents we have lost trust because promises in the past were never kept.
I can understand the need for a recycling facility. Hopefully, others will be built to treat the waste streams emanating from other regions in Malta. As yet no other site in Malta or Gozo has been identified for the construction of other recycling facilities and this has me worried.
If Sant Antnin is the only site to be built my fear is that eventually much more than 71,000 tonnes of waste will find its way to our locality. This is why a guarantee that binds future governments is necessary.
Furthermore, the fact that the proposed plant will contain a waste to energy facility is another worrisome situation. With government currently considering plans to bring forward waste-to-energy solutions from the 2013 deadline initially outlined in the waste management strategy, I strongly fear that with the Marsaskala plant being the only facility with such a structure in place, it will turn out to be the prototype used by government to start burning or digesting waste.
All we are asking for is a guarantee that what is being proposed for Marsaskala will remain valid for the next two decades or so. Anything short of such a guarantee will find our opposition as residents.
A Spiteri
Marsaskala
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