Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1468438
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 22 MAY 2022 OPINION 10 Raphael Vassallo OPINION 'A government that listens'… to zookeepers HAVING spent the last 10 or so years interviewing at least one different person a week: I found myself sympathising with my colleague Laura Calleja, in her futile efforts to a elicit a single, coherent answer from Animal Welfare Minister Anton Refalo. In case you missed it, I'm re- ferring to a press event this week in which Refalo launched (and here, I quote from yester- day's MaltaToday report): "yet another round of public consul- tation, this time for a national animal welfare strategy…" 'Yet another'… 'this time'… it all already points in a certain direction, doesn't it? But just to overlabour the point any- way: this is not exactly the first time that Anton Refalo has an- nounced more or less the same sort of 'public consultation ex- ercise' (and with 'more or less the same fanfare', too…) Back in November 2020, the Animal Welfare Ministry had similarly launched a "Public consultation on […] the Keep- ing of Wild Animals in Zoos Regulations." And according to the accompanying government White Paper, the objectives were: "to protect wild fauna and to conserve biodiversity by providing for the adoption of licensing, registration and inspection of zoos on the ter- ritory of Malta […]; to protect the health and well-being of an- imals; and to protect the public from these animals." But, oh well… you can already guess what happened next, can't you? A full 18 months later, there is still no sign what- soever of any new law regulat- ing unlicenced zoos in Malta. Indeed, nothing at all seems to have changed, regarding the entire situation concerning 'the keeping of wild animals' in Malta… except, perhaps, for a few, teenie-weenie little details, here and there. For example: just one month after the launch of that White Paper, the same Anton Refalo – answering a parliamentary question by former MP Mario Galea – revealed the sheer ex- tent of the problem that is now his to 'solve'. He tabled a list of 'just un- der 400 wild animals [that] are known to be kept in captivity in Malta'. And this list, we were told, "points towards a marked preference for big cats, with a total of 64 tigers, 20 lions, 11 leopards and 24 pumas…" Naturally, this brings us to another 'change' that has tak- en place since November 2021. Over the last 18 months, the number of recorded 'big cat at- tacks' in Malta has (unsurpris- ingly) also increased… from at least three, to at least five. Apart from the much-pub- licised recent case, in which a dog was mauled by a 'puma and a leopard' in Ghajnsielem, Gozo… Health Minister Chris Fearne has separately con- firmed that: "A person in Malta required hospital treatment af- ter they were bitten by an exot- ic animal." (Note: it fell to this newspaper to reveal that the 'exotic animal' was actually one of those '64 tigers', kept in one of Malta's many 'unlicensed zoos'. Honestly, though: who would have ever guessed?) To these two recent cases, we must also add the two 'big cat attacks' on little children that we know about so far – i.e., a boy and a girl, injured on two distinct occasions by (respec- tively) a tiger, and a lion; and another case, in which a wom- an had her arm mauled by a lion… after being encouraged (by the zoo-keeper, no less!) to 'pet' it, through the bars of its cage … But in any case: all this, I sup- pose, only reinforces the sheer necessity of having a proper law in place, to regulate a sector which – quite evidently – poses a significant risk to human life and limb (not to mention, of course, to the health and dig- nity of the animals themselves). And besides: it was also the entire point of Laura Calleja's question to begin with… which I shall now take the liberty to paraphrase, in three distinct subsections (if nothing else, be- cause that's how often Anton Refalo's non-answers forced her to repeat it). 1) What the heck happened to that "Public consultation on the Keeping of Wild Animals in Zoos Regulations," anyway? Why is there still no corre- sponding legislation, almost two whole years later? 2) Did you, by any chance, simply succumb to pressure by all those 'zoo-keepers'? [Note: You've got to hand it to Nicole, though: that's kind of blunt, even by 'Frost/Nixon' stand- ards…] And lastly; 3) Seeing as how nothing ever actually came of the last 'con- sultation exercise' held by your ministry… is there any particu- lar reason why we should ex- pect this latest one to turn out any differently, in the end? There: I think we can all safely agree that – in a country where the number of 'human injuries inflicted by wild animals' seems to keep increasing (in both fre- quency, and severity), year up- on year – those are not exactly unreasonable questions to ask. Unfortunately, however, I can't exactly say the same for Anton Refalo's reply: which can effectively be summarised in just five words: 'We're a gov- ernment that listens'. (Because everything else he said after that – e.g., 'we are preparing the draft consultation"; "we're here to draw up laws that re- spect animals' dignity", etc. etc. – was all clearly about the new Animal Welfare proposals launched this week: and noth- ing to do with 'zoos' at all…) And… um… what do those