Chaos and confusion dominated the early hours of this morning in Valletta, and it wasn’t just inside Castille that tensions were high.

As members of the Maltese and international media houses were inexplicably locked inside Castille by plain-clothed individuals just after 3am, the scene outside Castille wasn’t much prettier.

In a video sent in to Lovin Malta, protesters by Castille’s side-entrance can be heard being shouted at to leave the area.  As they walked down Merchant Street and began turning onto Melita Street, some of the protesters can be heard shouting as commotion erupts just up the hill.

A man standing by ministerial cars can be seen lunging at one of the protesters, only to be stopped just in time by the one police officer in the area.

The protesters then rush away, with foul language being hurled from both sides.

“The gang was waiting on the other side of Castille”

“We just happened to go there because we followed people running,” one of the witnesses on the scene told Lovin Malta. “We found a group of men who weren’t just the drivers, stood near the cars of the ministers. With no barriers and no police.”

“These guys threatened us not to get any closer to them and to get out of that street,” the person continued. “Merchant street, a public street. They told us they’d do something to us otherwise.”

“While the police officer – please note there was only one there – was also trying to keep us back and supposedly protect us from getting hurt by one of these men, one of the protestors was getting punched by one of the members of this gang,” the person continued.

“This is absolutely crazy,” the witness ended. “Politicians now have gangs protecting them who will threaten protestors to stay away from them.”

What do you make of this clip?