Free Buses, €50M Green Grants & a 1938 Revival: Malta’s Triple Whammy Announcement Explained

Bells rang out across Valletta at noon on September 28, 2025, but they weren’t the usual cathedral chimes. Instead, the sound came from every parish band club, fire engine, and school xylophone that could be mustered, heralding a triple announcement that will reshape Malta’s next decade: free public transport for all residents starting October 1, the opening of the national call for “Kunsilli tal-Belt” (city councils) to apply for €50 million in green-infrastructure grants, and—most colourfully—the revival of the medieval Żejtun harvest procession, last held in 1938.

Prime Minister Robert Abela broke the news from the Upper Barrakka Gardens, flanked by orange trees and a choir of Gozitan schoolchildren singing “L-Innu Malti”. Behind him, the bastions were draped with banners reading “Maltin, Flimkien ‘l Quddiem” (Maltese, Together Forward), the slogan that has dominated Labour’s post-election billboards since June. The timing was no accident: September 28 is the feast of St. Wenceslas, patron of workers, a nod to the trade-union roots of the Labour movement and a wink to the thousands of commuters who have complained for years that the only thing pricier than a Tallinja card was the petrol to get to the bus stop.

Free transport, however, is only half the story. From January 2026, every resident—tourists still pay—will tap their Maltese e-ID on new crimson card readers, a colour chosen after a heated Facebook poll beat out “azure” and “honey-yellow”. The €42 million annual cost will be funded by reallocating unspent EU Recovery & Resilience money and a new 3% levy on short-stay platforms like Airbnb, a move hailed by the Għaqda tal-Kabbar Maltin (Maltese Hoteliers Association) as “finally levelling the playing field”.

The second announcement shifts the spotlight from buses to balconies. Environment Minister Miriam Dalli invited the 68 local councils to pitch projects ranging from car-free core zones to rooftop-community gardens. Birkirkara mayor Desirei Grech immediately live-streamed her intention to pedestrianise the entire 17th-century quarter around the Old Church of St Helen, while Sliema’s independent councillor Gabriel Farrugia countered with a plan for floating pontoons that would turn Qui-Si-Sana beach into a “blue park” at low tide. Applications close on December 13—St Lucy’s Day, traditionally when Maltese households switch on Christmas lights—so expect a winter of lobbying sweetened with seasonal imbuljuta tal-qastan (chestnut & cocoa soup).

Yet it was the third revelation that drew the loudest cheer. Culture Minister Owen Bonnici, himself a Żejtun native, proclaimed that next September 28 will see the return of “Il-Ħarġa tal-Żebbuġ”, a pageant in which farmers once carried olive branches from the parish church to the fields, blessing the soil before planting. The tradition died on the eve of World War II when rationing scrapped public gatherings. Its resurrection will feature 500 costumed villagers, a newly composed hymn by indie-folk band The Travellers, and a farmers’ market restricted to produce grown within a 15-kilometre radius—an idea borrowed from Tuscany but baptized Maltese with the addition of ftira-making contests and a petting zoo of the island’s rare black chickens.

Reactions on the Granaries in Floriana were immediate. Eighty-two-year-old Karmenu Brincat wiped away tears as he recalled marching as a seven-year-old behind the village band. “We had nothing but the rhythm of the drums and the scent of the olives,” he told Hot Malta. “Tonight I’ll tell my American grandchildren they must come home next year to walk with me again.”

Not everyone is elated. PN spokesperson Darren Carabott warned that free transport “risks becoming a free-for-all” unless capacity is added on the congested Birkirkara-Valletta corridor, while environmental NGO Din l-Art Ħelwa urged that the €50 million pot come with binding height-limit rules after rumours that one mayor wants to swap garages for high-rise “green towers”.

Still, as the sun set over the Grand Harbour and the band marches dissolved into the clatter of late-summer cafés, the sense on the ground was unmistakable: Malta has decided that its post-pandemic identity will be defined not by passport sales or casino cranes, but by shared spaces, shared soil, and a bus seat no longer hostage to the price of diesel. Whether the promises bloom like the legendary Żejtun olive or wither on the vine, September 28, 2025 will be remembered as the day the islands tried to turn the page—together, and for free.