Government gives golden boost to Joseph Portelli’s Mercury project

Labour party donor and Gozitan construction magnate Joseph Portelli has been given another big push by the government to convert his multi-million euro  Mercury Towers project in Paceville into a cash cow as Finance Minister Clyde Caruana declares it part of Malta’s Special Designated Area (SDA).

Through a legal notice published earlier this week by the Finance Ministry, the government signed off on a law allowing foreigners, including EU citizens, to buy unlimited amounts of property in Mercury Towers and Pender Place while also benefitting from tax incentives.

Property industry sources described it as “a significant government move to make Portelli’s mega project more attractive to multi-millionaire foreign buyers, particularly Russians, Saudis and Chinese, who can invest their cash into multiple properties as an investment.”

The sources said that, while projects such as Portelli’s are normally admitted to the once-restricted Maltese list of SDAs, the government “fast-tracked” his entrance onto the “golden list” while other developers who have been trying to obtain this special status for their projects are being kept waiting.

Portelli has become Malta’s leading developer over the past few years, and is known to enjoy a ‘special relationship’ with the Labour government.

Just before the last election, he organised a private dinner at Ta’ Frenc restaurant for Prime Minister Robert Abela, to which a select few Gozitan businessmen were invited. The next day, Labour announced that its electoral  campaign fund raising marathon had raised a record sum from its Gozo constituency.

The latest financial statements for Mercury Towers reveal that the project is behind schedule, with inauguration being postponed from this year to 2023. The commercial retail mall and Melia Hotel are now expected to open in the last quarter of 2023 .

Besides Portelli, the company’s directors include Stephen Muscat, former CEO of Maltacom (now Go Plc), which used to own the land where the towers are being built, and Peter Portelli, executive secretary of The Strickland Foundation, owner of The Times of Malta.

They blamed transport and logistics delays for pushing back the completion date of the project.

The 34-storey building will contain more than 300 apartments, plus 170 luxury  suites measuring 60-square-metres, a retail mall and a hotel. According to the directors, most of the apartments have already been sold on plan.