As we approach the New Year, invariably we express our resolutions, our hopes, our aspirations and our plans. Just after Christmas we hold L-Istrina, our greatest show of solidarity. Solidarity that does need numerous “free” gifts, making it so much more genuine and spiritual. By the time this piece is published, we will know what this event has reaped. I am hopeful we will have equalled last year’s achievement and even surpassed it.
Solidarity and cooperation should be the call words for the New Year. There are countless areas where these values can be expressed and put into practice. Allow me to mention two.
I am perturbed by media comments emerging over the last weeks regarding the lack of homes for unsupported disabled. I am referring to disabled persons who have depended throughout their life on the love, care and sacrifice of their parents; persons who cannot live alone. When their parents pass away before them, which is usually the case, many of these brethren of ours cannot live and survive alone. The only alternative seems to be an old people’s home – the state one that is.
This is certainly not conducive to their rehabilitation of sorts and the expression of any talents and initiatives they may have. We must address this problem as a priority, together with other pending problems such as pensions and poverty.
I hope L-Istrina funds will be directed to this area. Perhaps they have already been but I don’t feel like going through the long list of beneficiaries. The President is working tirelessly towards the solving of or, at least, alleviating social problems. Together with his particular focus on the sick, I am sure he will also address the plight of the active disabled.
Another area for cooperation, which I believe is long overdue, is the setting up of a Trades Union Council. Unfortunately, this has been on the cards for some years but there has never been any serious commitment by the main unions, without distinction. The General Workers’ Union puts itself forward as the promoter of this initiative or project but, then, seems to lack the balanced and impartial credentials required; the GWU being so close to the Labour Party and openly exhorting it, while criticising the government at every opportunity.
The Unjoni Ħaddiema Magħqudin, on its part, grasps this situation and holds the unions are too far apart to be able to unite or, at least, cooperate in a TUC and this largely due to the GWU’s political stance and declared position. Nothing will dispel what is much more than a perception.There are constant squabbles in the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development, which has become largely a talking shop and I can agree with Minister Austin Gatt on this one. If the unions really aspire to better the plight of their members, then a serious effort for national cooperation must be made and what better than in the form of a TUC?
Solidarity, not to mention balance, impartiality and serious journalism, will continue to be hampered in the New Year by the continued existence of party political stations, which churn out biased news bulletins and items as well as current affairs programmes with a predetermined purpose and aim. Topics are chosen to suit the station’s party and then the prima donna and maestro conducting them manipulates questions and answers in order to score points for his party. This is a disgrace to true journalism and its ethic.
We do have a watchdog, of course, which, again, is nicely balanced between the two main political parties and in no way reflects the views of society in general. There is an independent chairman who holds sway but, then, we have seen many weird and incomprehensible decisions of his over the years.
The four members of the Broadcasting Authority are chosen equally between the big parties and are expected to toe the party line. I say expected because these members can act totally independently of the party that nominated them from the moment they take their seat. But do they?
I believe (to be corrected if I am wrong) the “Labour Party reps” have been there for many years, if not decades. Besides the fact they have now become dinosaurs, their ideas must have become mouldy and entrenched.
I am proud to say I feel the Broadcasting Authority, of which I formed part some 20 years ago (as the Prime Minister’s nominee, mind you), was not shackled by party diktat and many were the occasions where our individual views crossed “party” lines and we agreed many times. It was then that the party stations were introduced. A big mistake, indeed, and I am also happy to say I am on record in the official minutes (some time in the early 1990s) as opposing the granting of licences to stations owned by political parties.
To my knowledge, we are the only democratic country, at least in the western hemisphere, where a political party actually owns a station. Shame. As one correspondent wrote in these columns, these stations should be wound up for financial reasons. I say they should be wound up for political and democratic reasons.
Happy New Year to all. Will there be prosperity, solidarity, social justice and, above all, happiness? That has still to be seen.