Chronicle of a tragedy foretold

The four people who lost their lives in Sunday's Gharb fireworks factory explosion were not the only victims of the tragedy. With them died also the myth that Malta was slowly beginning to make progress insofar as Occupational Health and Safety standards are concerned: that, with our country safely anchored in the European Union, such issues as security standards at fireworks factories (among other areas) would finally be addressed.

Sadly, however, it appears that we were wrong. Almost a decade after EU accession in 2004, our national approach to such issues as pyrotechnics remains unprofessional to an alarming degree. So much so, that Sunday's fatal explosion was effectively a carbon copy of yet another fatal explosion that had taken place in the same area barely two years earlier: in September 2010. Both explosions left multiple victims in their wake, as well as an entire village - the same one, as it happens - traumatized by the experience. And there have been other similar incidents in recent years: almost too many to list out here.

Faced with such a grisly repetition of history, one has to ask why our country continues to tolerate such a substandard approach to such an obviously dangerous practice. Another even more pertinent question concerns why no action had been taken with regard to the recommendations of an independent inquiry into the September 2010 explosion... an inquiry which had even foretold that another large-scale accident was 'inevitable' in either 2012 or 2013.

Placed in the context of Sunday's accident, it seems little short of astounding that all the authorities concerned would obstinately look the other way, despite having been warned so explicitly about a existing threat to the lives and limbs of people in a very specific area.

One is uncannily reminded of that telling detail from survivor accounts of the last hours of the Titanic, which sank almost exactly 100 years ago last April. On that occasion the ship's captain had ignored telegram warnings of icebergs in the vicinity... and we all know what happened as a result of that foolhardy decision.

Meanwhile we are left with the positively disquieting implications that ours is a country which simply refuses to acknowledge that its  problem even exist. This impression - i.e., that we deliberately ignore all the things which we don't want to hear or see - has now even spilt over into the ongoing electoral campaign: with billboards presenting both Labour and PN leaders as having their eyes and ears firmly shut in a bid to shield themselves from the ugly reality without.

Obviously, fireworks factory explosions were far from the minds of the party strategists who came up with those images. Yet they are remarkably apt to illustrate a country in which both major political parties have consistently abdicated their responsibilities towards the safety of their citizens... sometimes with fatal results.

In this particular instance, their abdication was literal. Having requested, and been given, recommendations for actions to avoid precisely such accidents in future, the government simply ignored the incoming advice. Can anyone therefore be surprised, when an explosion predicted two whole years ago occurred, almost precisely on cue, last Sunday?

The answer is clearly no: but it is slightly surprising that a government which claims (on paper) to value human life so highly, would simply do nothing at all when faced with a such a real and predictable threat to the life and limb of its own citizens.

At this point, some uncomfortable questions have to be asked. Why is no one considered criminally culpable for ignoring warnings that may otherwise have saved four lives? Such negligence would be considered a crime in other countries. Why not here?

Meanwhile it is hardly an excuse, that the implementation of these recommendations had to be shelved because of the resignation of former home affairs minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici, That resignation occurred last May; but government had previously been sitting on the same report for over a year. Why, then, had no action ever been taken before?

Mercifully, there is at least a small silver lining to the otherwise ominous cloud that Sunday's explosion has yet again cast over our islands. For arguably the first time in living memory, the political reactions to the tragedy were not - as they have traditionally always been - limited merely to offering mindless platitudes of commiseration to the families of the victims, while attributing the tragedy to some unlikely 'act of God'.

On this occasion, there have been critical voices within the establishment itself. Labour MP Anton Refalo took the unprecedented step of calling for an outright ban on fireworks production: a little extreme, perhaps, but it makes a refreshing change from the fatalistic approach preferred by so many of his colleagues on both sides of the house.

And, consistent as always, the Greens have reiterated their calls for a moratorium.

It remains to be seen if such calls will be backed by public opinion, as they so clearly should. One thing, however, is certain: maintaining the status quo is simply not an option. The recommendations have been in government's hands for two years: let us act on them now... and not wait another two years for yet another fatal tragedy to remind us of how lethal our own lethargy can prove.