Armier squatters likely to get substation after 2012 rejection

Enemalta is considering plans to construct an electricity substation at Armier to supply customers in the area, including the hundreds of squatters who inhabit the illegal shantytown (pictured) on illegally appropriated public land.

The Malta Environment and Planning Authority turned down plans for a substation under the previous government in January 2012.

Earlier this week Enemalta confirmed that it was installing smart meters in those illegal beach rooms which are already provided with electricity.

Enemalta justified this as a measure to stop the theft of electricity.

A spokesperson for Enemalta confirmed that the corporation is seeking ways how to improve the area’s distribution network, “which may require the building of a substation.”   

The spokesperson claimed that Enemalta has for years been receiving complaints about voltage regulation issues from its customers at L-Ahrax tal-Mellieha and L-Armier areas.

“Among these customers there are also several businesses which have properties or operations in the same areas.”

Apart from squatters, the area also includes some farmers and lidos. Two of these lidos are also illegal.

The current government is bound by a pre-electoral agreement with the Armier lobby, promising to regularise boathouses constructed before 1992.

An application to construct a substation costing €82,000 next to the shanty town was first presented in 2007.

The squatters had first raised their case for a reliable supply at a meeting with Minister Austin Gatt in November 2005.

According to the Armier boathouse owners’ newsletter, the minister simply told them that they were knocking on the wrong door and that they should talk to Enemalta directly.

A month later the Armier squatters met an Enemalta official who told them that the only way to increase the voltage in Armier was through the construction of a new substation to replace the 2,000-metre long overhead lines.

Just three months before the election, in November 2007, Enemalta applied to construct a substation at it-Torri l-Ahmar, a few metres away from the illegal boathouses.

In 2008 a spokesperson for the Ministry for Infrastructure, Transport and Communications justified the new substation arguing that the substation will  “benefit all registered consumers in the area” and is “not specifically connected to the provision of supply to boathouses.”

In 2008 Enemalta confirmed that 110 boathouses in Armier were registered for electricity.

But plans for a new substation were met by protests from environmentalists and were rejected by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority in January 2012.

During a public hearing Tarcisio Barbara, president of Armier Developments Ltd, called on the MEPA to approve the substation in the light of a promise made by Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi back in 2008.

“Does not MEPA fall under the direct responsibility of the Prime Minister?” asked Barbara to the applause of the squatters who packed the hall.

But Sandra Magro, who was then chairman of the Environment Planning Commission, answered that the authority was bound by its planning policies, in this case the Structure Plan, which calls on the authorities to demolish all illegal buildings on the Maltese coastline. 

During the meeting the Enemalta official insisted that the substation was justified because of the low voltage in the area. He claimed that the nearest substation was 1,500 metres away and this meant that in summer voltage in the area was low.

He was repeatedly challenged by Sandra Magro to specify which users existed in the 300-metre radius of the proposed substation, alluding that the only users were the Armier squatters.

The Enemalta official replied that the Armier squatters were provided electricity according to the legal framework, which existed in the 1970s and 1980s.

Armier lobbyist Tarcisio Barbara insisted that the boathouses were there to stay and would never be removed as they catered for a social need recognised by all parties. Therefore according to Barbara the boathouses should be supplied with electricity. He also held Enemalta responsible for any health hazards in the area if the substation were not approved.

The Planning Directorate argued that any ODZ development could only be approved if there was a justification for it and in this case there was no valid justification.

Concluding the meeting, Sandra Magro upheld the Directorate’s argument that there was no justification for the development. All members of the board voted against the development.