BirdLife Malta in denial according to Mark Mifsud Bonnici, President St Hubert Hunters Association

The Birdlife Malta (BLM) president insisted hunting illegalities were on the increase. Asked to quantify, Joe Mangion of BirdLife flatly refused and quoted alarming percentages that in reality amount to a pittance. Clearly admitting to reality does not reap benefits.Ironically BLM’s partners, the Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS), seem to have divergent views: “The monitoring of migrant bird hunting on Malta by CABS and other conservation organisations has led to a decline in poaching. Massacres on the scale of those carried out in the 1970s are thankfully a thing of the past. Thousands of migrating birds of prey, herons, storks, bee-eaters and other protected bird species were seen safely off the islands on their way to their winter quarters in Africa.”

Mr Mangion also denied BirdLife Malta benefited financially from exaggerating the extent of illegalities. As referred to by the programme hosts, the UK Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) petition, presented jointly with BLM to Malta’s Prime Minister in 2007, generated three quarters of a million pounds.

The UK marketing agency that worked on the RSPB petition and funding campaign leaves no doubt as to who benefitted from the funds: “This was something altogether different, and there was a concern that RSPB members might be reluctant to give money to be spent overseas, not on ‘our’ birds. Of crucial importance, the donation form and protest card were on one piece – making it harder to return the signed form without including a gift.”

Gullibly, 92,000 RSPB members signed the petition and donated £750,000 which Birdlife Malta would rather not comment about.

Clearly there are benefits to be had from the hysterical hype that leads indoctrinated fools to donate cash as a “gift”.

What better way is there to keep such a sham flourishing than to avoid answering incriminating questions?