The PBS board of directors has taken exception to the editorial titled ‘It’s good news, according to PBS’, which appeared on March 14. The board issued both a statement, which was read out on the main 8pm TVM news bulletin that same day, and also sent a letter for publication to the Times of Malta (which appeared last Friday).
The first thing to note is that it was the board of directors that reacted and this when, besides its own news set-up, PBS also has an editorial board.
Secondly, the board seems to prefer to focus solely on “balance and impartiality in broadcasting”. Balance and impartiality are demanded by the Broadcasting Act and the Constitution, as the board rightly points out.
But taxpayers expect more, much more, from the State broadcaster than just walking the impartiality tightrope in news management. Yet, even if one were only to focus just on balance and impartiality, fingers could still be pointed at PBS, now and in the past. Take what the outgoing Ombudsman, Chief Justice Emeritus Joseph Said Pullicino, a former chairman of the Broadcasting Authority, told The Sunday Times: “I think that PBS was never impartial. It’s just a question ofhow biased it is. A matter of degreeor dosage.
“Unfortunately, this depends on the people involved at the time and to what extent they allow interference. So long as the government of the day appoints people at PBS and funds the station, there is always a big risk.”
The leader the PBS board of directors objected to was mainly about why it is imperative for the State broadcaster to have the best possible news service on the island.
The board of directors seems to be arguing that all is well because PBS news enjoys the best audience and that, over the past three years, it was never sanctioned by the Broadcasting Authority for any infringement onthe basis of lack of impartiality or unbalanced reporting. Such attitude is very worrying.
Laws and ancillary documents dealing with broadcasting clearly underline the role State broadcasting must play in a democracy.
The National Broadcasting Policy (April 2004) says that “it is only PBS that can guarantee news and current affairs programmes presented in a balanced and impartial way solely based on news value criteria”.
It also notes that “all the reports taken together [must] present a truthful picture of what is happening around us, especially in Malta”.
Is that happening when the Broadcasting Authority finds PBS had gravely failed in its duties when it decided not to report immediately on a serious incident in Parliament involving two MPs late last year? Or when an affidavit by a senior civil servant directly involved in the Gaffarena property deal scandal does not feature among the main six headlines listed at the opening of the main news bulletin on March 7 and is the fifth feature to be reported, almost 18 minutes into the bulletin?
What the board of directors or, rather, the editorial board should focus on is a paragraph in the PBS ‘Guidelines on the obligation of due impartiality’ (2012
“Journalists, presenters and producers are not expected to be neutral on every controversial issue but care is to be taken that they do not favour one opinion as opposed to another in such a manner that gives advantage to that opinion or that invites the viewers or listeners to adhere to that opinion.
“Divergent points of view are to be dealt with even-handedly.”