How many hunters actually obey the law?

“I am convinced that a very small minority of hunters, break the law,” hunters’ lobby FKNK President Joe Perici Calascione told Sunday newspaper ILLUM. “I can see the differences between hunting as it was ten years ago and hunting as it is now. We are slowly isolating the few who still break the law.”

However, Calascione strongly objects to the government’s decision to close the hunting season.

“Instead of rewarding the good, as in every other country, we are punishing it. Closing the hunting season was a collective punishment, and because of it we’ve now gone back in time.”

FKNK’s general secretary agrees with him. “Even the government statement closing the hunting season admitted that much,” Farrugia said. “In my opinion, collective punishment on hunters was a rash and unjust mistake.”

Environmentalist Joe Sultana disagrees though.

“Many hunters say that less illegal hunting goes on during the open hunting seasons but that is a lie,” Sultana said. “I don’t agree that only a few hunters shoot at protected birds. If there are a few and they know who they are, then who is signing to allow them to acquire a license to carry a firearm?”
“The illegal hunting that we hear about in the media is only the tip of the iceberg.”

Read the full feature story in Sunday's edition of ILLUM.