Cowboys still rule Malta’s Wild West

When regulations for nightclub bouncers were introduced in 2012, we were promised that the free-for-all that existed – a situation where every Tom, Dick and Harry could put on a black T-shirt and be employed as a private security guard, with the accompanying ‘licence’ to insult, shove, punch and kick people for no apparent reason – would end once and for all.

The so-called reform meant that one had to have police, army or private security experience to be given a bouncer’s licence, which one could not perform the job without.

Yet those familiar with nightclub areas, particularly the Paceville area, will tell you that the reform has hardly changed the system, and cowboys still rule Malta’s Wild West.

Some years back, it was an all-Maltese profession, the only requirements for which were being a big, burly guy with a penchant for fighting. Then came the foreigners. Most clubs started employing equally distasteful individuals from foreign countries which, for various reasons, gave the profession an even worse name. The fact that some of them

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doubled as drug pushers might have had something to do with that.

But the actors in those horrific scenes we saw this week, caught on CCTV during an incident that took place earlier this year, were all Maltese. There were six of them, and their job was to ensure that troublemakers were not allowed inside the club and to make sure that their patrons and staff were safe at all times.

One of the victims of the brutal attack, a young Libyan man, was refused entry into the club and we will not go into the why and how. We do not know if he had been causing trouble or if he was inebriated. Frankly, that is not the point. Whatever the reason was, he should not have been attacked from behind and subjected to punches and kicks from some bouncers as their colleagues looked on, even as he fell unconscious to the ground.

A bouncer’s licence is not a licence to fight, but a duty to maintain order. The shocking scenes also saw another bouncer throw a glass bottle at another man, who was also grievously injured after allegedly suffering a beating by the six out of shot of the cameras, as well as another man being rammed, by a bouncer, into a club enclosure.

What is more shocking is that these scenes are not some rare, one-off incident, but rather an all too common occurrence in the streets of Malta’s clubbing mecca. Any youth who frequents the area will tell you so.

What was also very distressing was the time it took the police to get to the scene. According to TVM, the police only showed up 15 minutes after the ordeal and, when the cavalry finally showed up, it only had one trooper. Had the Libyan man’s injuries been more severe, he could possibly not be alive to tell his tale today.

In an area where fights are as common as cocktails, the police should be able to respond in a matter of seconds. The area needs to be better manned because, despite all the talk from politicians about how security has been beefed up, the boys and girls in blue always seem to come up short when they are needed. It is high time that rhetoric is followed up by real action.