Zoo permits draw political fire over planning and animal welfare

According to Times of Malta, the Planning Authority sanctioned unauthorised structures at L-Arka ta’ Noè and approved further development there, including additional facilities on land outside the development zone. Separately, the Animal Welfare Directorate granted Montekristo Estate a zoo licence valid until October 2027.

Those are the concrete decisions behind the outrage. The politics came after.

ADPD spokesperson Mark Zerafa said L-Arka ta’ Noè’s operators were allowed to settle outstanding planning infringements by paying a €57,000 fine, which then cleared the way for further development. His objection was not subtle. Environmental damage on ODZ land, he argued, does not stop being damage because a fine was paid, and keeping animals in captivity for entertainment is not redeemed by tidy paperwork.

Momentum went at the Montekristo decision from another flank. The party questioned how a zoo licence for that estate fits with Labour’s 2026 manifesto pledge not to issue new zoo licences to facilities keeping dangerous animals, to stop such animals being replaced when they die and to phase them out from Malta’s zoos. Executive member Katya Compagno also pointed to Montekristo’s record, including a 2021 conviction for offences that, the report said, included operating an illegal zoo, failing to register animals and causing unnecessary animal suffering.

That does not establish, on its own, that the licence was improperly issued. It does make the government’s explanation harder to avoid. If a manifesto promise was meant to signal a policy direction, parties are entitled to ask where that direction went when a licence was granted.

Both parties also raised the issue of retrospective regularisation. Here too, the dispute is not abstract. One authority regularised unauthorised structures and permitted more development. Another licensed a zoo despite the criticism now attached to its history. Public bodies often act in separate files; the public sees the combined outcome.

ADPD called for greater transparency over the Montekristo licence. Momentum said the government should explain whether its manifesto pledges on zoos were genuine commitments or campaign language that yielded once an actual licensing decision arrived.

What can be said from the report is narrower, and solid for being narrower: L-Arka ta’ Noè’s unauthorised structures were sanctioned, Montekristo was licensed until October 2027, and both decisions have now been turned into a test of how seriously the government wants its animal welfare promises taken.