Works on restaurant for PM’s friends start despite pending appeal

Transport Malta will not wait for the conclusion of an appeal against its permit to build a luxury water’s edge restaurant disguised as a Capitanerie in Ta’ Xbiex, despite the prime minister’s promise in 2023 of a new law disallowing development projects to start before an appeal is decided.

While the prime minister is still to present his new law, announced more than a year and a half ago, contractors B&B construction of Naxxar, on behalf of Transport Malta, started works on the new building, taking up an access road and part of Gzira’s only garden.

The restaurant, being built through public funds, is to be delivered to the owners of Gardens Marina Ltd upon completion. The company, which manages the 25-year concession of the marina is owned by very close friends of Prime Minister Robert Abela and his wife, Lydia.

Known as tal-Gedida, siblings Paul and Mark Gauci from Birkirkara obtained the marina concession from Transport Malta in 2018, following a tender.

So far, Transport Malta has refused to explain why the Capitanerie, which is part of the concession, is not being built by the private investors themselves and not by Transport Malta.

According to the plans approved by the Planning Authority in 2022, which faced hundreds of objections, the Capitanerie – primarily intended to host the offices of the marina’s operating company – will actually host a large restaurant.

The plans show that while the one-storey building will have an 89-square-metre office space, the rest of the building consists of an indoor restaurant of 160 square metres, with an added outside dining area of 175 square metres and a shop of 13 square metres.

These will all be passed onto the owners of Gardens Marina Ltd for commercial use. Sources told The Shift that the Gauci siblings had already entered a commercial agreement to lease the restaurant and bar areas to a third party.

Apart from Paul and Mark Gauci, FL Yachting Ltd and Intermanagement Ltd, represented by Matthew Fiorini Lowell and Patrick Satariano, are also shareholders in the marina’s operating company.

Gardens Marina started operations in 2019 and is paying some €220,000 in yearly concession fees to the government.

According to its latest accounts, it registered a loss of almost €200,000 in 2021 despite a turnover of €613,000.

The prime minister and his friends

Paul and Mark Gauci are two well-known businessmen carrying their late father’s nickname, tal-Gedida, a successful businessman primarily in real estate and second-hand automobile sectors.

Their relationship with Prime Minister Robert Abela and his wife goes back years, even though the Gauci family was known in Birkirkara to be staunch Nationalists until Labour was elected to power in 2013.

The Gauci brothers run several businesses and are mostly known for their large automobile showroom on Birkirkara’s Valley Road. There, they run Gauci Automobiles Company Ltd, which sells luxury cars.

Just a few years ago, part of their large showroom was leased, through direct order, to government agency INDIS Malta – at the time under the political clout of Chris Cardona, who used to be elected from the Birkirkara district.

Paul and Mark Gauci, along with Prime Minister Robert Abela, own large luxury yachts and spend many weeks together touring the Mediterranean during the summer, particularly the Marina di Ragusa in Sicily. They are also close family friends, frequently seen together dining with their partners in various restaurants.

Last August, Lydia Abela was spotted attending a luxury dinner at tenor Andrea Bocelli’s hotel in Forte dei Marmi in Tuscany. She was accompanied by the partner of Mark Gauci, Charlene.

Robert and Lydia Abela also regularly frequent Sky Spirit, a gym in Luqa owned by the Gaucis.