Animal awareness......... birds are also animals!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Maybe those few who have started reading my humble blog, may have wondered why I have refrained from hitting out at hunters and defending the plight that birds go through, while being on our islands.

Well, the reason was that I was trying to steer clear from the subject of hunting and trapping - an environmental plague for Malta and Gozo. I tried to concentrate on OTHER issues, you see.

But, how can you, when you see and read about the horrible things that are taking place around us?

A couple of days ago - it was Saturday evening - I was watching an Inspector Barnaby episode on LA 7, an Italian channel. And in this episode, a group of young hooligans were passing their time, at night, going around the wood with their four-wheel drive, shooting at anything that moved. And this man, known as The Green man - a stramb, we call him in Maltese, for he didn't have a roof over his head, he didn't live in a house like we do, instead, he preferred living surrounded by nature, in the wood. And this Green man turned up from the middle of nowhere and stopped these youngsters, telling them that it was evil to shoot simply for the love of killing creatures. He laid emphasis, using just a couple of sentences, to show the difference between killing for the fun of it and killing in order to get food to eat.

I remembered this when I read the following news item, this morning:

Ministry, MTA condemn 'senseless act' by Chris Galea, di-ve news
VALLETTA, Malta (di-ve news) -- September 24, 2007 -- 1430CEST -- The Ministry for Tourism and Culture and the Malta Tourism Authority have strongly condemned the 'senseless act committed by irresponsible persons' at Nadur Tower in Dwejra over the weekend, when dead birds of prey were placed in an observation post used by birdwatchers. Whilst expressing their support to BirdLife's efforts to attract birdwatchers to Malta, the Ministry and the MTA noted that these efforts were yielding results as witnessed by the sell-out bird-watching camp held over the past days and the keen interest shown by tour operators specialising in bird-watching holidays to include Malta in their next brochures. "The placing of dead birds of prey in areas frequented by these bird watchers goes against our tourism offering, based on hospitality, heritage and diversity. This act will damage our prospects of developing this tourism niche and will generate unwanted negative publicity for Malta in our main source markets," the Ministry and the MTA said in a statement. "Tourism benefits us all and we must all support it through our actions. These few individuals with their wanton acts are doing the opposite," the statement went on. Whilst auguring that the Police find the co-operation from all quarters in their efforts to identify the culprits, the Ministry and the MTA concluded by reiterating that it is in the interest of all -- not least of the majority of hunters who observe our laws and regulations -- that the few who persist in breaking the law are brought to justice.

You see, my friends, ... these hunters - I wouldn't call them 'few', but then, I am not preparing myself to be elected yet again! - do not merely kill in order to stuff their big, fat mouths with the fowl that they shoot, as if that creature was predestined by God Himself to be eaten by that particular hunter; but now, they're taking pleasure in shooting beautiful birds and putting them in a place for all to see, to spite, as it were, the representatives of foreign interference that this country is being subjected to (sic!)!

Now if that isn't sick, what is? I ask you!

As that Green man said to the youths - by shooting for the sheer pleasure of it, as MOST OF the Maltese hunters are doing (unlike our Maltese politicians, I have guts and I have the courage to say things as I see them!!!), we are attacking NATURE itself, and one day, sooner or later if not already, NATURE will be having its own back. And the reaction will kill us all, not just those damn shotgun-wielding bastards!

But what can we expect from such 'people'?

But, most of all, one should criticise their leader, FKNK Secretary Lino Farrugia, who some days ago gave a press conference in which he used words such as 'foreign interference', 'persona non grata', etc....

What does this man expect? Does he expect that Malta should close its doors to foreigners? Especially now that we are, thankfully, members of the EU?

Or, does he expect people not to take a stand against those hunters who think that they own the whole of Malta, and forbid people from walking along the countryside as they please?

Let's turn to politics. Heaven forbid is any one of the bigger Parties should succumb and promise hunters the earth, in order to garner more votes. Heaven forbid. We are already in a bad way, with the stand this present Administration has taken. To turn the clock back would mean to deny us, the real 'innocent citizens' of these islands, from enjoying what is, by right, ours.

It is a mystery to me how it is that there is so much land that belongs to private individuals. I do not own such land. How come did this land fall into fellow citizens' hands? When was such land bought? How was it bought? What documentation do these people have to show, to prove that that land is theirs? Just by wielding a gun towards me will not stop me from walking along common pathways in our limited countryside.

How can the present administration speak about 'self-regulation' with such 'people'? They hardly know what the word means. All they know is how to spend time shooting away at anything that moves, rather than being busy earning their livelihood. Malta is a small country - and we hear of various works grinding to a halt because the workers unilaterally take time off to go hunting ... or trapping, for that matter.

This 'man' believes that the country should be enjoyed by locals. Hmm..... by 'locals', does he mean 'hunters and trappers' or all the peace-loving Maltese people? Don't bother to answer: the truth is there for all to see.

Well, things have to change, in Malta and Gozo. We simply cannot continue taking from Nature that which is not ours! Migratory or other kinds of birds are mine as much as they are Lino Farrugia and his ilk. And if I say that I want those birds to remain alive, I have as much right, being an 'innocent citizen', as my hunter who lives next door!

A Post Scriptum: The Director of BirdLife Malta should be replaced by a Maltese citizen. In that manner, Mr Tolga Temuge, the present Director, will be thanked for his interest and hard work and will no longer be the aim of representatives of our local stupidity, ignorance and closemindedness.