It is a mass phenomenon that has spread across most of the civilised world and especially in Malta: the refusal to speak about or discuss anything that touches race, the clash of civilisations or religions for fear of being called racist.

We have in huge quantities in Malta.

Let me start off by speaking about the rape orgy by men of Middle Eastern appearance in Cologne (and not just there) on New Year's Eve.

It is only now that the news has become mainline and has been spoken about, discussed and reacted to across Germany and all over the world.

But for many days after 1 January it was very hard to find any mention on the mainline news channels. This was also the case in Malta. It was only when the news became mainline in Europe that it became mainline in Malta.

Even so, the reactions in Malta are still confined mostly to the anti-migration voices whereas in Germany - and across Europe - reactions have seriously undermined everything that was achieved when Germany opened its doors to the Syrian migrants.

All the human stories behind those million people undergoing the huge trek from Turkey to Germany to flee from war and want have been forgotten. Those who had warned against such a welcome can now say they have been proved right: these people have no intention of subscribing to what we hold true dear in Europe: freedom and equality of the sexes.

Maybe the vast majority of the Syrian migrants in Germany have nothing to do with these 1,000 or so rabid men involved in the Cologne attacks. Or maybe this is commonplace not just in Syria but elsewhere in the world.

Columnist and anthropologist Mark Anthony Falzon wrote: "What happened in Cologne on New Year's Eve sounded very familiar. It reminded me of Mumbai and the millennium celebrations of 31 December 1999. That evening, I decided to see in the New Year at the Gateway of India, in the company of a group of (mostly European) friends. As expected, the place was crowded; in particular, there were thousands of young men milling around. At around midnight, things got ugly as groups of men attacked every woman they could lay their hands on (quite literally). Now 'Eve teasing' (sexual harassment, usually groping) is not uncommon in Mumbai, especially where foreign women are concerned. This, however, was different. The scale and extent of the harassment were jaw-dropping. I have a vivid memory of a six-foot-something Sikh man fighting to pull his wife away from a bunch of young men who were assaulting her. At one point we had to form a kind of cordon around the four or five women in our group, just to prevent them from being raped right there on the street. It was awful, and very, very terrifying. We somehow made our way to the club at the Taj hotel and spent the rest of the night there. It was the only safe place we could find."

Day after day, news comes in of similar sex attacks elsewhere in Germany and in Europe. This is not the first time there has been such a mass migration phenomenon in Germany but in no other instance was it so huge, so uncontrollable. These people came in mistakenly thinking that they were welcome, they were invited and that everything would henceforth be handed them on a plate. They speak and think as if they had a right to be taken in, were owed a roof over their head, a job and food. Nothing is further from the truth.

As has been pointed out in the past few weeks, this migration wave added to the huge stresses and pressures Europe is facing with the crisis and the euro problems. This wave can now break down the Schengen system, another building block in Europe. From here to integration will be a hard climb and nothing can be taken for granted. The worst thing Europe and Germany can do is to sweep this under the carpet and carry on as if nothing is the matter.

Which brings me back to Malta. On Christmas Day, which fell on a Friday, and then on New Year's Day, also a Friday, a crowd of Muslim believers congregated on the Msida seafront and held their Friday mosque gathering since, it was said at the time, the places where they had earlier congregated were faced with (probably Mepa) Enforcement notices.

This was first brought to public attention, if I remember correctly, by the PN media (who then fell rather silent on the issue).

Then the Muslim community replied in L-Orizzont showing they had a police permit for their prayer meeting.

The issue is still not mainline in the non-Maltese media but on Friday, TVM had footage of the prayer meeting and some reactions, including of Muslims who said they were not disturbing anyone.

Now, in the way that any news of this sort has, the issue is growing and growing. The Maltese Patriots, who have had various protest marches in the past months, not all of them well-attended, have announced a protest march next Sunday. Soon, the issue will no doubt spread to the many discussion fora on television, maybe even Xarabank.

I believe the issue was handled badly. From comments made by Msida local council, it would seem that they were neither involved nor consulted. Nor do the police seem to have consulted anyone else. Certainly, there does not seem to have been any consulting on the part of the government.

Only mischief can come out of this. Although as a nation, we do not discuss race, religion, the clash of civilisations, this issue is never far away from our national consciousness, especially in view of the influx of migrants over recent years and what must have come as a revelation to many on Friday: that there are about 35,000 Muslims in Malta.

I do not see any move leading to a better handling of the explosive issue, especially on the part of the national leaders, whose inactivity is leaving the way open for all sorts of unofficial action.

And there is a further point I want to make: I will not put up any more with people sidling up to me to try and get more details about what I write. What I write is in the public domain and the authorities have all the relevant facts to hand. What they do not have is any enthusiasm for taking action and being responsible for the consequences.

There is probably massive social fraud going on under our noses. In our civilisation, girls do not normally marry until they are 18, but in other civilisations they are married off at a much younger age - only they do not call it marriage and the girl still lives with her family.

Some Muslim fathers chose not to live with the mother of their child/children for Social Security reasons, so they marry a Maltese girl to acquire residence and the wife declares that she has no husband (even though he is openly living with her) so she can get social assistance.

Investigators visit and ask about the men's clothing they can see and are told it belongs to nannu.

And so the system is milked in such a blatant way that not even Maltese are allowed to use.

It is when such abuse is allowed to go on unchecked that the seeds of tomorrow's mayhem are sown.

 

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