If you ever stopped to read the writing on Floriana’s Porte des Bombes (Heaven forbid that you did stop, it is after all in the middle of a main road) you would have read the inscription “Ad maiorem popoli comoditatem” which is latin for “For the greater comfort of the people”. The events of the past few weeks have led me to reflect whether our national efforts at public building is in fact heavily conditioned by what the people want. Most times we are busy adorning roundabouts with random decorations from phallic symbols to kitsch statuettes and cacti and luzzi. Those who had a taste of what passes for power on the island seem hell bent in dedicating memorials to themselves which explains a proliferation of busts and statues – which would be ok if we had a sense of proportion.
Gates though. That’s a tricky one. The history of City Gate also includes anecdotes as to how the main consideration in one of its reincarnations was that Carnival Floats should be able to pass through the entrance. One of the city of gentlemen’s entrances had to bow to the needs of the burlesque community. When a supposed architect was at the helm of the nation we could do no better than boxing in the main entrance with a series of shoddy arches, an arcade of libyan-arab shops and travel agencies and of course a housing estate. Ad maiorem popoli comoditatem indeed.
This time round the people are still trying to get their heads around the presence of a major architectural installation and plans. Most of the people fail to think with their own heads and come to their own conclusions. Instead, the Piano Plans have to bear with the fact that their genesis and development coincided with the first part of the Taghna Lkoll plan that involved the creation of a general sentiment of unhappiness and discontent. Let’s call it the Tort ta’ Gonzi phase. It was a phase in which anything remotely connectable to the government of the time was somehow deemed as wrong and almost as a punishment of the people. A couple of billboard personalities (ye old two dimensional figures) lent their faces to this quest and hey presto … the “Cheese Grater” and “Roofless Theater” were born.
Add to that pre-electoral schemings and promises to the hawkers of Valletta and the stage was set for the barbarians to take over the latest version of the gate. Have we improved much from the time when the prime consideration for a new gate was whether a carnival float could get through it? Not really. Our Prime Minister is adamant that there is nothing wrong with the location for the monti. This time he has reserved the populist decision to the look of the stalls but not to the location.
The sad thing is that this should never have been a decision of the people. Not in the case of the aesthetics and urban planning it isn’t. But this is Malta where the size of statues of saints and carnival floats will determine the width of the street, the height of the lampposts and the shape of a gate.
You would be worried if the barbarians had got to the gates. The thing is you look around you and you notice that they have been everywhere all along. It will only take a bit getting used to won’t it? After all under Taghna Lkoll, everything goes. You just have to be a little more optimist and a little less negative.
