Risk of serious crowd accident at concert

While it was great to read that MTV wants the Malta concert to be a permanent fixture, I found the comments by Kevin Razvi of MTV Networks International, regarding ground control by the Maltese organisers, slightly surprising (June 27).

I agree that the musical event is fantastic and makes for good entertainment but I have to strongly disagree on the matters of crowd control. There were between 50,000 and 60,000 people in a relatively small area with not one wave-breaker or crowd control barrier - to break up the pressure - in place.

I am a regular festival goer and I can assure readers that anywhere else, for much smaller crowds and in bigger venues, there will always be barriers to stop the pressure from building up and to avoid terrible accidents from happening. In my opinion, Malta has to count itself lucky that over those last few years no more serious mishaps have happened than a few people fainting.

In 2000 in Roskilde, Denmark, nine people were crushed to death at a rock festival as the crowd started pushing - and with crowd barriers in place!

Another sore point is the absence of security personnel in the crowd. In the area where I was standing, violent fighting broke out several times, with no one nearby to stop the fight and to remove the troublemakers. All I could see were a few security men in front of the stage, on the other side of the barrier, in an area where people weren't allowed.

The government is keen to have Malta portrayed as a desirable destination. Do they really want to risk a potentially fatal accident by simply not following the rules of the game? It is just not enough for the responsible minister to urge people to use public transport and behave on the way home if the real danger lies elsewhere.