Letters to the editor – March 27, 2026

St Patrick’s Day nightmare

Marie Louise Cilia of St Julian’s wrote:

Residents in St Julian’s are now back to their usual hectic life.

The yearly St Patrick’s Day event is over. Every year it is getting bigger and louder. Some residents leave the comfort of their homes to a quieter place.

Housebound and ill people have to bear a solid 12 hours of loud, thumping music and yelling of drunken people.  

Hundreds of revellers celebrating St Patrick’s Day in St Julian’s. Photo: Matthew Mirabelli

The presence of the prime minster and the leader of the opposition was a great disappointment, mingling and having selfies, to their own interest, with drunken youths. I doubt the PM would like to see his daughter joining this senseless event; most youths don’t even know anything about St Patrick.

Our local council gathers a significant amount of money which they tell us goes to help the village feast, water polo club and others. It is also used to clean within a few hours, boasting of collecting 11 tons of beer cans and plastic bottles and hosing the area from vomit and pee. Year in, year out complains fall on deaf ears. 

It is disrespectful to residents and causes traffic chaos and any unfortunate accident is never foreseen. Hopefully, by next year, the authorities will take heed of our plea and this uncivilised event will be held elsewhere. 

Check-in delays

Michael Vella of Sliema writes:

Seeing the new border controls at Malta International Airport (MIA) for non-EU passengers, which are causing long waits at check-in with the risk of losing flights, it is suggested that separate check-in desks for such passengers be introduced to facilitate check-in for EU passengers.

It is quite easy to introduce border controls but, at least, take into consideration that Malta is an EU country and some sort of preference should be given to EU nationals. The authorities at MIA should take note of this.