Pushbacks and hand grenades: COVID-19 migrant crisis fuels social media hate

Social media comment boards turned into a hotbed of toxic remarks and xenophobic free-for-all as Malta closed its ports to migrant rescue charities, placing irregular migration on top of the island’s ‘coronavirus agenda’.

The Maltese government says it will face the brunt of migrant rescues at sea after Italy shut down its ports due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic in its country.

But a Cabinet decision to prevent migrant rescue charities from disembarking asylum seekers in Malta, coupled with an attack on NGOs as abetting smugglers, unleashed a toxic backlash on social media.

On Facebook, critics showed open virulent disdain for Maltese and international humanitarian NGOs, accusing them of profiting off migrant rescues.

Academics who signed a statement calling on the Prime Minister Robert Abela to open the ports to migrant rescues, were ‘named and shamed’ on Facebook walls of far-right groupings and parties.

Added to the toxic language were comments by Labour activists Alfred Grixti – head of Malta’s social welfare services agency – and broadcaster and former union leader Manuel Micallef, father of a Labour MP.

First Grixti said migrant rescue boats should be scuttled, then again on Facebook, Micallef hypothesised a situation where an “African migrant” on his deathbed is given the last ventilator available in hospital. “One patient is an elderly family member of yours, the other a 21-year-old African immigrant. Who gets the last ventilator?”

The comments coloured the virulent divide that exists in Malta in the migration debate: anger for Micallef, who then claimed his post was not meant to be racist, before removing it; but also support for comments like Grixti’s.

But it’s not just notable political figures who have found their voice on social media. The debate breathed new life into anti-immigration Facebook groups like Defend Malta, now sporting a new cover photo featuring the words ‘FCK NGO’.

Groups like these are regularly posting anti-NGO and anti-migrant messages, with a series of captions discrediting their efforts. One of their recent posts calls on migrant rescue ships to be scuttled, which are then followed by a series of comments from followers calling on the migrants to be left at sea to “sink or swim”.

Others call for the hackneyed push-back, but users go as far as posting gifs featuring bombs and fire, insinuating asylum seekers should be blown up. The same anti-immigration mantra is prevalent on pages of the far-right party Moviment Patrijotti Maltin and other social media discussion fora.