Watch: Ira Losco Says ‘I Will Not Stick To Singing’ As She Tears Up At Bernice Cassar Uni Vigil
Beloved singer-songwriter Ira Losco was visibly emotional today at a vigil for Bernice Cassar organised on the University of Malta campus.
“It seems that history repeats itself over, and over, and over again,” Losco said, before breaking into tears.
“After Paulina’s brutal murder, we thought all of the online comments, articles, protests and vigils had counted for something, and the femicide before that, and the one before, and the other before that,” Losco started.
“I cannot say anything that can bring Bernice back, or any of the other women who were taken away from the world too soon, who left children and family behind,” Losco continued, crying.
“But as a woman I can definitely use my voice and I can speak up. I will not just stick to singing as many have told me to do. I will speak if it encourages women to speak up, because it is our voices that will keep waking up the world and transforming it.”
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Today’s vigil saw a number of other speakers pay tribute to Bernice and raise awareness on the worrying number of femicides and domestic violence cases plaguing Malta in recent years.
Men Against Violence founder Alexander Dimitrijevic called out a culture “that has a problem with women, that sees women as a problem that has to be solved, that blames women for things that are done to them”.
“These are women that the system failed,” KSU President Alex Gaglione said of Bernice and the rest of Malta’s recent femicide victims.
“It’s easy to collectively call them victims and forgot their individual stories, and even though as a law student but above all a woman I’m frustrated and moved by every case of femicide, Bernice’s murder had a particularly stronger than usual effect on me. Bernice did everything she had to do. But the fact that we’re still here crying for our sister angers me so much.”
Following another speech by former president Marie Louise Coleiro Preca and a performance of the song Waking Up To The Light by Ira, a book was opened for people to leave their condolences to Bernice Cassar’s family.
“Bernice’s murder horrified us all,” former president Marie Louise Coleiro Preca told the gathered congregation.
“God knows how many women who never even spoke out were shocked and felt that now is an even better time to shut up. Especially when we found out that Bernice did everything the way she should to protect herself and her children. No, it’s not society that failed her. It’s the uncoordinated systems failed her. It’s the institutions that should be armed with human resources failed her. The people who were meant to see that these things don’t happen failed her. We won’t get anywhere with laws.”
Rest in Peace Bernice
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