Over two decades of empty promises for Crafts Village renovation

Politicians have been promising to renovate the Ta’ Qali Crafts Village for 22 years now. Despite the fact that thousands of tourists and Maltese people flock to the village every year to admire the work of local artisans, these promises remain unfulfilled.

In 1992, then Finance Minister George Bonello Dupuis announced plans to restore the Crafts Village. MEPA gave the green light to these plans two years later. However, village artisans were only asked for feedback four years later. In January 2001, then Home Affairs Minister Tonio Borg said that the Cabinet was going to publish a call for tenders for the project in six weeks’ time.

The Nationalist Party’s 2008 electoral programme promised that “everything is in place for works on the Crafts Village project to start.” They said that the project would cost €28 million. The EU ended up refusing the government’s request for funding.

In November 2013, Economy Minister Chris Cardona announced that works on the Crafts Village were set to begin in a year’s time.

Almost a year has passed and everyone’s still waiting…

Read the full feature story in Sunday’s edition of ILLUM