Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1211430
7 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 16 FEBRUARY 2020 NEWS Believe! F.A.I.T.H smile for the camera: from left Ema, Chanelle, Maya, Demi, and Megan ishing third, an impressive feat since the show's model tends to favour solo entries. Even on the franchise's parent show X Factor UK, only one band has ever come in first place, global hitmakers Little Mix, who won the compe- tition in 2015. "We're all insanely grateful for the opportunity that X Factor has given us. It opened doors that otherwise would have remained closed. I don't think any of us would have been able to audition for, say the Eurovision; we just don't have that level of financial stability to pull something like that off. The competition really just blew the doors to the music industry wide open. It may have included a lot of crying and being hungry… but it was totally worth it," Caruana said. And they also had words of praise for the often misunder- stood manager Howard Keith Debono, their mentor. "Howard is so genuine, he's so honest," Vella says. "We've cried so many times with him, and we all know he's a really good crit- ic and everything he does is to make us better." Although she admits being incredibly nervous upon first meeting the producer. "I had him for my first audition, and I was scared as hell." "My parents weren't that sup- portive at first," Caruana said of her experience in X Factor. "There's often this preconcep- tion about the music industry in Malta… but X Factor helped shatter the barrier that I had be- tween myself and my parents on the topic." Zarb agrees. "My father had an issue with me pursuing music at first. Obviously in Malta school is very important and for a lot of people it's either one or the oth- er: that's something I'm trying to figure out myself, so I under- stand his initial hesitation." PHOTO JAMES BIANCHI Howard Keith: genuine critic THE Planning Authority is be- ing faced with a strange case where owners have cited past eligibility to war damages to justify their turning a pile of rubble, into a new dwelling outside development zones in Attard. Developers are citing a 1957 contract in which the buyer of an old building in the Habel Librin area had renounced "the right to any compensation for war dam- ages". Applicants represented by lead- ing planning lawyer Ian Stafrace insist that only dwellings were eligible to compensation for war damages so the building had a residential use, making it eligible for reconstruction under present planning policies for countryside ruins to be rebuilt. After suffering extensive dam- age during WWII, the building was abandoned. The case officer recommended refusal of the per- mit, since the building was already in ruins in 1978 and therefore in- eligible under present rules. The case officer also insisted the war damage compensation clause did not confirm the residential status of the property. The owners want to build a one-storey structure of 100sq.m, reduced from an original 150sq.m. Instead of outrightly rejecting it, the PA's planning commission has re- quested legal advice on wheth- er war damages were limited to dwellings. Only one member, Carmel Caruana, insisted on rejecting the project. War damages claim for permit