We, the street artists of City Gate, would like to take this opportunity to rectify the inaccuracies of Noel Grima’s two recent articles in The Malta Independent on Sunday regarding our presence at City Gate.

We find his description of us as ‘peddlers and hawkers’ particularly offensive, as on 22 June of this year the Maltese courts categorised seven of us as street artists, with permission to return to our usual spot at City Gate.

The definition of a street artist (or busker) is clearly separate from that of a hawker or peddler. Also, it should be noted that in the first article of 7 August, Noel Grima stated that “an attempt at a clean-up (of buskers) had been made some weeks ago”. He is misinformed: The street artists of City Gate cooperated with the police during that time, as it had become unclear to them what the specifics of the busking law were. The court case was merely a means to clarify the interpretation of the law for all parties concerned.

The article of 7 August was actually written prematurely, since at the time of publication, the police hadn’t yet “cleared City Gate of buskers” as the headline announced, making the follow-up article also incorrect, especially by stating, “by Monday, the peddlers and hawkers were back in force.” In fact, when scrutinising the article, it is difficult to find an entire sentence that is factual.

He wrote: “The fact that so many government and police resources had to be used just to move these peddlers a few metres away shows how ingrained lawlessness has become.”

On Monday 8 August, the police came for the first time and politely asked us to set up our stalls outside City Gate, in Freedom Square, from then on. We complied immediately with their request. Of course we had questions, but we showed none of the aforementioned “lawlessness”.

We have yet to see Noel Grima with a notebook at City Gate assessing real public opinion. How many tourists has he spoken to know we give a bad impression?

In our experience, we find that tourists, visitors and residents enjoy seeing us at work, producing crafts before their eyes. In fact, in all major cities of the EU, buskers are not only allowed, but also given prominent places and treated with respect rather than as second-class citizens. Maybe Noel Grima is not worldly enough to have travelled to foreign cities and seen our European equivalents or he would not be referring to us as a third world market.

Perhaps there are some people who think that we are in some way illegally working. In fact, in order to work there, it is necessary to be registered with the VAT Department and with the ETC. We work very hard and sometimes in difficult conditions, but we choose do it because we do not wish to claim benefits and because of the satisfaction that we gain in selling a product that we have made with our own hands.

One final point needs to be made about Noel Grima’s latest article. In the current politically correct world, we are very surprised that The Malta Independent on Sunday would actually print the description ‘the coloured man’. The MAN has gained himself a reputation for doing an excellent job in shoe shine and repair, which is why he managed to make a half page photo in The Times.

This is our reply to Noel Grima’s unfair, uncharitable and racial articles.

Susan Molyneaux, Mandy Cassar, Alisdair Boult, Victoria Bugeja, Franklin Bugeja, Clare Cuschieri, Pavlina Rihova, Vincent Grima, Michael Sammut