‘No common sense’ in Comino hotel project

Seven NGOs yesterday staged a counter-exhibition in response to developer Hili Group’s proposed plans for Comino and its claim that the project will be conducted sustainably.

On Friday, Hili Ventures CEO Melo Hili announced that the company had signed a deal with luxury hotel brand Six Senses to operate a hotel at Comino’s San Niklaw bay and luxury short-let villas at Santa Marija Bay, site of the previous hotel’s bungalows.

The company highlighted Six Senses’ focus on sustainability and being close to nature.

But activists who oppose the plans say the developer is greenwashing.

“All six senses will be there,” environmental scientist John Paul

Cauchi quipped yesterday, “except for common sense.”

“You can see with your own eyes that there will be more buildings,” Cauchi said, pointing at a graphic that highlights the increase in villas and space that will be taken up in Santa Marija Bay.

Cauchi said the building volume at the bay would increase by 49 per cent if the developer’s plans to build 19 villas, each with their own pool, were to be approved.

“We have already seen what has happened to Malta and Gozo. Are we going to do the same to Comino,” Cauchi asked a crowd of activists gathered outside the Mediterranean Conference Centre in Valletta.

The bay will also feature a new pier that will only increase traffic and will transform the currently tranquil area into an elite village with yearround occupancy, Cauchi said.

The project would increase the bay’s developed footprint by 12.6 per cent.

“We want a quiet and protected bay, one available for the public,” Cauchi said – one left untouched or, better still, preserved and protected and not made for rich tourists.

“They don’t want us resting there,” Moviment Graffitti’s Marie Claire Gatt said, arguing that companies such as Hili made their money off the common person instead of for them.

“Don’t think we will let this go quietly,” Graffitti’s Andre Callus said as he promised the NGOs would not give up the fight.

Meanwhile, Hili Group said yesterday that more than 55,000 endemic trees, plants and shrubs will be planted in the project as part of its contribution to the Natura 2000 site.