Every week, rain or shine, my wife and I drive to Kalkara, that beautiful suburb of the Cottonera, to visit relatives. It means going through Cospicua twice and in opposite directions. Not infrequently, on our way out of the Three Cities area late in the evening, we come across army-manned checkpoints at which – each and every time – we smilingly acknowledge to each other the sad truth that we are getting on a bit.
Why? You see, we hit on this realisation as soon as the young, prudent soldier beams the light of his powerful torch on to our faces and immediately, sometimes even with a regimental gesture, waves us back on our way home. For all he knows, we could be carrying a carload of the stuff that would keep the Marrakesh medina happy for at least a couple of months, but obvious age and physical condition render us outright innocents.
There must be only two chief reasons why this particular checkpoint is almost always mounted at the very same spot in the outer limits of Cospicua: either the law-enforcement corps on the island believe this is a good catchment area for drug-traffickers and drug-users, or there is some prejudiced old jerk among them who would rather waste the soldiers’ time there when they could obtain more fruitful results elsewhere on the Island.
In fact, had we been a Bonnie and Clyde charade of senior citizens trafficking drugs, it would have been much easier for us to simply avoid what is now a routine Cospicua checkpoint. In this 21st century, well past the times of the marauding Ottomans, the Cottonera Line of bastions has many other outlets, thank goodness.
But we are not, and the only once that I got a polite tut-tutting from the young soldier and his powerful torch was when I was not wearing my seat belt. On that particular occasion my wife was seemingly so amused by the lad’s sombre reprimand, she half expected him to put me in handcuffs. To her credit, even as a passenger, she never forgets to wear it.
Age revelations apart, I am one who fervently believes in strict road control in this traffic-infested island with a huge drug problem. In fact, it is good news to sometimes learn there are also checkpoints in other places and a recent one at St Julian’s even came out with the goods.
The presence of policemen and soldiers on our roads will not turn us into a police state. It is not treason to admit, after all, that we are a nation of no-hopers when it comes to rules and regulations, alas. Cairo and Naples can breathe freely. This rightly necessitates the inevitable: resorting to the use of such public controls that are, understandably, not very popular with the majority of not-so-law-abiding citizens.
The army has in fact had to react to recent Media reports about complaints from drivers who were stopped at its checkpoints, insisting it endeavours to fulfil its tasks and assignments in a “professional, courteous, polite and safe manner”. While as far as my Cospicua experiences are concerned I will personally vouch for all that, it is known there have been people claiming to having been “ill treated” and “humiliated” at army roadblocks. After all, it only takes a young soldier who hasn’t had a bite for some hours to be on edge, and only a driver genuinely anxious to get to his destination to lose his cool, ergo a fit of double pique.
A much more disquieting development in the sector of traffic and people control on the road is the disclosure that policemen who do not issue “enough” fines are themselves being punished and consequently charged with a so-called “service crime”. It seems to be working, by the way, for this very morning outside San Gwann at about 7am, when most of us have cars on auto-pilot mode, a traffic policeman was already handing out a ticket to a bemused, half-asleep commercial van driver.
I could not hear the crisp conversation that went on, but can somehow imagine it to have been in this spirit...
Policeman: Now that makes a good start to my day’s tally. The Commissioner will be pleased.
Driver: Sorry, eh, (yawn) but what have I done?
Policeman: Do I really have to tell you?
Driver: (yawn) Please do (yawn). This is what I needed (Maltese expletive), as if the market isn’t already in a mess.
Policeman: I don’t have time to waste, it’s written for you on that slip of paper.
The policeman, happy to have made such a good catch, goes back on his chrome-plated bike and roars away, leaving the van driver, desolate and angry he has made such a bad one, loudly bemoaning his luck.
At a time when local wardens are reportedly being advised to adopt a more educational, rather than confrontational, role in their everyday job, this undeclared police scheme goes exactly the other way. While it is true that there is no lack of fertile fields to plunder in a country with less discipline than a mob riot, it is unfair on policemen to be denied the right of addressing problems in a more sensible way, i.e. minus the pragmatic use of the old pocketbook and the imposition of fines. A policeman who knows he could easily end up being accused of not reporting “enough contraventions” and eventually having to forfeit two days’ pay of his own wages, will only end up as a source of personal and public frustration, as if we need more of that on the road.
This is Easter Weekend, when Checkpoint Charlie caches are traditionally, albeit sadly, bound to be more plentiful. Cospicua or St Julian’s? Gozo or Paceville? Wherever they occur, the ideal scenario is an efficient, no-nonsense approach based on mutual courtesy and coherence.
And, of course, let the older guys and dolls drive past, uninterrupted, to their early beds.