Commissioner for Animal Welfare Alison Bezzina has called for increased awareness about the prejudices surrounding pitbulls after Foreign Affairs Minister Evarist Bartolo compared the canine breed with violent connotations.

"Will you vote for a pitbull or a gentleman? In politics, there are those who build bridges and seek agreement for the good of the people. What politicians do the citizens want: those who are able to agree with each other for the good of the people? Or pitbull politicians who spend all their time hating those who disagree with them?”, Bartolo wrote in one of his morning social media missives on Sunday.

The post received negative backlash from many animal lovers including Bezzina herself.

Hours later, Bartolo – seemingly in response to the backlash – made a second post: "I love animals very much. Dogs can be great friends to humans. Like dogs, politicians can do a lot of good but not when they fight and bite each other."

The first such post was accompanied by a picture of an aggressive-looking pitbull, while the second was accompanied by a picture of a pitbull playing with a child.

Bezzina told MaltaToday that she had spoken to Evarist Bartolo privately and that he was very receptive to the feedback and promised to take tangible action that will help animals in need.  She said that Bartolo’s post was not out of malice, but because of a lack of awareness.

“Yesterday, in an early Sunday morning Facebook post, Minister Evarist Bartolo likened Pitbulls to bad and aggressive politicians. Within minutes, more than 250 people took to Facebook to educate the Minister  about this harmful myth. Gone are the days when animal lovers will look away. Gone are the days when they could be ignored, and now with an election around the corner, gone are the days when animals had no vote,” Bezzina wrote on Facebook.