PN asks Auditor General to probe American University of Malta’s land swap agreements

PN MPs request audit investigation of land transfer agreements between government and Sadeen, operators of AUM

6 February 2023, 4:24pm
by Kurt Sansone

1 min read

PN MPs Darren Carabott (centre), Graham Bencini (left) and David Agius exiting the National Audit Office where they asked for an investigation of the AUM land swap agreement the government signed last year

TWEET SHARE

The Nationalist Party has asked the Auditor General to investigate the transfer of land at Smart City to Sadeen for the construction of a university campus.

The PN’s members of parliament’s Public Accounts Committee – Darren Carabott, David Agius and Graham Bencini - formally submitted their request to the Auditor General on Monday.

They asked the National Audit Office to look into the contracts signed last year between government and Sadeen Education Investment Ltd, the company behind the American University of Malta.

The PN MPs said the government gave the company a tract of land measuring 30,000sq.m for the price of 47c per square metre with a perpetual ground lease that can be redeemed.

In back-to-back deals, government last year took back the land at Żonqor Point in Marsaskala, originally given to Sadeen for the construction of a university campus, and swapped it with a tract of land within the confines of Smart City in Kalkara.

The deals were approved by parliament but the Opposition had voted against them on the basis that Sadeen had failed to attract enough students to even justify its AUM Bormla campus let alone a bigger one at Smart City.

Kurt Sansone is Executive Editor of MaltaToday. He was formerly deputy editor of MaltaTod...