Behind the bombings

The bomb that wrecked a car and almost killed its intended victim at Msida on Monday morning caused a shock wave all over Malta that grew and grew as one found out that there have been five car bombs over a space of 13 months.

Predictably, the noise of the bomb soon got smothered by political comments. Now there is much that political comments can and did say on the matter, and it cannot be said they were completely out of place. But there is also what lies beyond political comment.

It is undoubted that beyond what can be seen by the naked eye, there is another Malta, where there is an extended gang warfare. We may not know what is going on around and underneath us, but they know each other, a microcosm with its own rules, its vendettas, its rules of the game. And now we get to know, somewhat to our surprise, that the police know what is going on because they describe one or other of the victims as ‘known to the police’ whatever that means.

There are other countries where this situation exists or has existed – Mafia country, first of all, and certain countries prevalently in Central America – where innocent bystanders can find

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themselves in the line of fire.

So far, there have been no noticeable results from the investigations on these five bombs. The police authorities are what they are and some of the comments and criticism about changes in the higher ranks of the police, and about an exodus of capable policemen from the Corps are not out of place.

One urges more in-depth study of the clues from each bomb explosion: It would seem a specific type of explosive is being used. Where is it coming from? Is there a central importer and distributor? Is there a network dealing with explosives?

Another line of possible police investigation should be about the background to each and every victim. When the police speak of persons ‘known to the police’ we understand that the investigators have a good idea of what is going on, whether it is drugs manufacturing and distribution, money laundering, loan sharking, prostitution, people trafficking, etc.

Even without going into the political aspect, the country asks what are and have been the results of the police investigations? There have been many murders in recent years which have all gone unexplained. The police corps is asked to take its investigations in a more serious manner.

Maybe it is also time to revisit the laws in this regard and perhaps increase the penalties for those who risk the lives of citizens. Maybe this can be related to a possible law on terrorist activity where the lives of innocent citizens can be put in jeopardy.

Maybe too, as has been pointed out, there is need for a greater police presence on the roads. This would not have stopped the bomb at Msida, but at least it would have handled better the ensuing huge traffic jam where everything was left to haphazard and the only police activity we could see was energetic police sending people off from the garden and putting up the police banner prohibiting people from entering that zone.

But deep down it is true the people feel defenceless when faced by all this mayhem and they feel that the gangs and the criminals have grown bolder and bolder that today they do not bother about continuing with their gang warfare in mid-morning and in one of Malta’s most dense crossroads.