The Malta Police Force last month unveiled its corporate strategy for 2025-2030, a plan built on three pillars: ensuring public safety, strengthening trust and legitimacy, and delivering smarter policing. Within these pillars lie 15 priorities and 75 commitments ranging from crime prevention to transparency, data-driven policing, and the adoption of emerging technologies. On paper, it is a forward-looking plan, full of language about efficiency, accountability, and safer communities.
Yet the key question remains: will this strategy translate into real, tangible change for the Maltese people?
For decades, citizens have felt the imbalance of policing. Too often, ordinary people are pursued with zeal for petty crimes, while individuals with influence, wealth, or power appear to slip through the cracks unchallenged. Petty thieves, small-time traffickers, and those who commit domestic violence must, of course, be pursued and punished – society is safer when these crimes are addressed. But such efforts cannot come at the expense of tackling the “big fish”, the individuals and networks whose actions corrode national institutions, destabilise the economy, and erode public trust in the rule of law.
The police should not be in the business of picking faces. The law must apply equally to all. If policing continues to show vigour against the powerless but hesitation against the powerful, then no strategy, however sophisticated, will restore trust.
The new corporate strategy speaks of strengthening legitimacy and accountability. That promise will be meaningless unless the force shows that no one is above the law. People will not measure success by how glossy the documents look or how advanced the data dashboards become. They will judge by whether corruption is prosecuted, whether money laundering is pursued without fear or favour, and whether those who sit in boardrooms or government offices are investigated with the same intensity as those who loiter on street corners.
The plan also makes a welcome commitment to crime prevention through community policing and hotspot identification. These are valuable tools, and international experience shows that crime is best tackled at its roots. But prevention cannot stop at the street level. Preventing “white-collar” crime, organised financial wrongdoing, and institutional abuse is just as important, if not more so, for the nation’s long-term safety and prosperity.
Similarly, the strategy’s emphasis on transparency is encouraging. Making key documents available online and publishing crime statistics are steps in the right direction. But transparency must also mean shining a light on the most sensitive cases. The public deserves to know not only how many burglaries occurred last month, but also how investigations into large-scale scandals are progressing.
Technology, too, offers opportunities. Artificial intelligence and data-driven analysis may improve operational efficiency, but no algorithm will replace the courage required to take on entrenched power. Tools can help, but leadership and integrity must lead the way.
If the police succeed in applying their 2025-2030 strategy fairly, Malta could see a transformation in its relationship with law enforcement. Enhanced victim support systems, improved accessibility to services, and higher forensic standards will all contribute to safer communities. But these will only be fully meaningful if matched by the will and institutional independence to pursue crimes at every level.
At its heart, policing is about trust. Trust that when one dials 112, help will come. Trust that when one reports abuse, the case will be taken seriously. Trust that when corruption festers, it will be rooted out regardless of whose name is involved. The police themselves acknowledge that strengthening trust is one of their pillars. The surest way to build that trust is by ensuring that justice is blind.
The Maltese people do not ask for perfection. They ask for fairness. The new strategy will succeed only if the force proves that it will go after the big fish with the same vigour as it does the small fry.