Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1539444
9 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 14 SEPTEMBER 2025 NEWS under db Group's rising towers town into an open-air nightmare while the local council strikes deals behind closed doors. The letter, signed by dozens of residents, called for full dis- closure of all meetings, corre- spondence, and agreements between the council and db Group. It also demanded a for- mal guarantee that no future discussions with private devel- opers take place without public involvement. Citing the council's "blatant lack of transparency," the pe- tition declared that residents had lost confidence in council- lors to represent them during the Planning Authority hearing for application PA 3218/25—a new application filed by the db Group this year to add seven more storeys to one tower and six more floors to the other. Instead, they requested that a resident nominee be appointed to speak on behalf of the com- munity. Residents also criticised the council for holding private meetings with select individu- als and families to ex- plain the deal, calling it a "divide-and-rule tactic" aimed at justi- fying the agreement. They demanded a single public meeting open to all Pembroke residents. Pembroke Mayor Kaylon Zammit has defended the coun- cil's decision to reach a deal with the db Group, insisting it is in the best interest of the community. He had told MaltaToday last August that after db's me- ga-project was approved, the local council moved to "ensure that Pembroke residents gain the best possible benefits". "This responsible and for- ward-looking approach has been backed unanimously by the Pembroke Local Council and will help us sustain our priority of delivering positive outcomes, even in challenging circumstances, to our residents and our community," Zammit had said. City Centre project: A history The Institute of Tourism Studies (ITS) site in Pembroke was transferred to db Group as part of a controversial land deal approved by parliament in 2017. The agreement granted the company a 99-year con- cession to redevelop the prime seafront location into a mixed- use project for a total of €60 million, with only €15 million being paid upfront. Originally, the project was proposed as a 38-storey tower and a 17-storey hotel, but the permit for this development was later revoked by the law courts. Subsequently, the company put forward new plans in April 2020 that reduced the size of the residential tower to 31 floors. A few months later the plans were changed again to accom- modate two towers—one of 17 floors and another of 18 floors, apart from the hotel. At the time, the db Group said it had "listened and acted" after pub- lic and institutional feedback, by voluntarily lowering the height and splitting the original tower into two. The company argued this created larger open spaces, reduced excavation by some 58,000 cubic metres, in- tegrated historic structures, and lessened disruption to sur- rounding residents and traffic. This proposal was granted ap- proval by the Planning Board in 2021 by a slim majority of five votes to three. In June this year, the db Group applied to add seven and six floors respectively to each of the two towers current- ly under construction. This will mean that the pro- posed towers will increase in height from the approved 17 and 18 floors to 23 and 25 floors, respectively. No addi- tional height is being proposed for the 12-storey hotel, which will be a Hard Rock franchise. If approved, these changes will result in an additional 82 apartments over and above the approved 162. *Names with an asterisk near them have been changed to protect the identity of the residents