Words and phrases lost in translation

Listening to any local radio or television station one will always notice the cold-blooded murder of the Maltese tongue by the so-called broadcasters.

Hereunder are just a few examples. They say “ġiet imwaqqfa soċjetà”, instead of “ġiet iffurmata soċjetà”, “rapport tat-temp” instead of “tbassir tat-temp”, “pilota” instead of “bdot”, “ġewwa Bormla” instead of “f’Bormla”, “mix-xena nternazzjonali” instead of “mill-aħbarijiet ta’ barra”.

This is a clear indication that they translate word by word from the English text, which is very wrong. The word “imwaqqfa” is surely translated from the English version “set up” which is correct in the English text, but saying “imwaqqfa” means that the society has ceased to exist, contrary of what one means to say.

The word hangar is always pronounced as “hanger”, and I saw it written that way in a scroll during a news bulletin on one of the local TV stations. Another wrong pronunciation in the English language is that the letter “d” and “th” are pronounced the same, which is a clear indication that they have a halting command of the English language: once they are written differently they should be pronounced differently.

Is the Broadcasting Authority not noticing these incorrect pronunciations, or are they only noting a TV station which exceeds advertising time by a minute?