My, my, what double standards – and then Astrid says she has no agenda

The threat of excavations beneath St John’s Square was considered cause for a national uprising of Anonymous and Friends on a petition, and for a great deal of loud noise and misinformation from Astrid and Flimkien Ghal Ambjent Ahjar. There are underground passages beneath! Who knows what we might find! Trolls! Knights! Ladies! Suits of armour! Remains! The Loch Ness monster! Leli ta’ Haz-Zghir! The cathedral will collapse! Residents and shops will be inconvenienced! The dust! The noise! My God!

Ah, but look at this now. St George’s Square is going to be EXCAVATED – yes, excavated – for underground parking (nothing nice, positive, tourism-enhancing, tapestry-housing and revenue-earning like a museum) and Astrid and the FAA are fine with that. Yes, they have “strong reservations”, but they’re going to be doing no screeching, no shouting, no rabble-rousing, no stirring up of the mob tal-puliti against target individuals, no casting of aspersions, no misinformation campaigns, no protests, and above all, no petitions or collusion with parliamentarians. Maybe it’s because this is all tax-payers’ money and there are no EUR14 million in EU funds to make them see red and want to botch the project.

Is the nature of the ground beneath St George’s Square any different to that beneath St John’s Square? No. Are there structures and passages? Yes, unlike beneath St John’s Square, which took a destructive hit during an air-raid. Are there shops and residents in the immediate vicinity? Yes. Is there a building as important as St John’s Cathedral sitting on the square? Yes, the Grandmaster’s Palace. Will it not be in imminent danger of collapse when ‘a quarry’ is excavated into the square outside? Apparently not. Or perhaps so, but it doesn’t matter to Astrid because the Grandmaster’s Palace is not ‘a national treasure’.

The situation at St George’s Square is EXACTLY the same as at St John’s Square – except for the fact that there are passangers beneath St George’s but not beneath St John’s (anymore) – but Astrid Vella’s reaction is entirely different. Why? You tell me. Perhaps she doesn’t resent George Pullicino – who is responsible for the St George’s excavation – as much as she resents Richard Cachia Caruana, Cynthia de Giorgio, and those poor monsinjuri.

Reported in the news today:

“The environmental group Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar said in a statement this morning that in a recent meeting with Minister George Pullicino, it was shown the positive changes to be undertaken at St George’s Square…..It said that while it still had strong reservations about the excavation of the square for the provision of underground parking, it was confident that the changes to this urban space would not only enhance the prestige of the square facing the Presidents’ Palace but would also greatly improve the enjoyment of the square.”

There are only two possible explanations for FAA’s behaviour:

1. FAA is for some reason comfortable with the idea of risking the stability of the grandmaster’s palace;
or
2. FAA was lying about the risk posed to St John’s, and had an ulterior motive.

It has to be either one or the other. There is no third possible explanation.