Broadcasting bias

The primary function of the Broadcasting Authority is to ensure a balance in broadcasting between political parties. When we needed it most, it wasn't there. When the Leader of the Opposition was banned from the only form of broadcasting in the country, ending up broadcasting from commercial stations in Sicily, the Broadcasting Authority was not constituted. Rather than being a toothless watchdog, it had been completely gutted. That was normality in Malta for a number of years.

Today it is merely toothless. Its board is made up of a chairman and two persons each nominated by the government and the opposition. It recently made history by proposing to ensure a balance in broadcasts from all stations including the anomalies that are the stations owned by the political parties. Austin Sammut, Broadcasting Bulldog, displays considerable doubt whether such a policy can ever be enforced. What happens if one of these stations persists in its infringements? Will the BA close it down? Can it send in the army?

Let's face it, the BA's announcement is truly historical. How did it happen? How did our rivals' nominees let it get past them, ineffectual declaration as it may be? It sounds like an explosion from the Ombudsman or a report of corruption from the Archbishop. It sounds like the State of the Environment Report from Mepa: a documentation of our helplessness. None of it is news but there is some relief when the silence in broken.

Useless regulators and completely foiled systems of checks and balances lie in disarray all around us. We have all the machinery but it is infested with all sorts of spanners in just the wrong places. It moves forward as slowly as possible without coming to a halt altogether.

In the run up to the 2003 election, the BA had come up with another stroke of genius. The political parties were asked whether notices of political events were to be considered to be political broadcasting. Only the Greens said yes. BA control on the issue vaporised.

In joint meetings with the other political parties before the BA board I have always been impressed by the arrogance which the other parties display with regard to this constitutional sanctum sanctorum. A vague attempt at ensuring a balance in broadcasting in the electoral campaign was made by the board that was instantly snubbed by the political parties. The superb political collaboration witnessed at such moments is simply stunning. It worked.

My gripe is not against the BA, not even for its pathetic stance that a balance in broadcasting is achieved by allowing the other parties a free hand. Its limits are set by the political environment in which it operates. If it truly tried to do its job it would have to call in the army as Dr Sammut implied. It is wise enough to avoid such crises. It fails to do its job and knows it well but it comes back to make another feeble attempt hoping to achieve improvement by small increments. It does what it can. So does the Ombudsman and Mepa too, I suppose. You have to be nuts to expect political parties that believe they have everything to gain in persisting in their misbehaviour to change their ways.

Nothing can save the BA or any other regulator. Only the people. At the present state of play the people do not seem to be aware of any interest they may have in getting the country's institutions to function as they were designed to do. The people are set to one-party mode: whatever my party does is right especially if it is to the disadvantage of the other party/ies. The idea that this level of cheating distorts the system as a whole never seems to enter anybody's mind. That it has a cost appears to occur to nobody.

Now imagine a tripartite nomination to the BA board. Will anything remain the same? Imagine the independence the chairman and his staff will begin to enjoy once it is not a done thing that the other parties can dominate the scene. Imagine all conspiracies to subvert the proper functioning of the regulator being made public at every turn. They may become pointless.

Waiting for that distant day in which everybody in the country internalises the idea of ownership of its institutions and develops a democratic sensitivity that allows him/her to call his/her party to account for the slightest infringement may be too long a wait. It is not going to happen in our lifetimes, perhaps not ever.

The shortcut is to have a third party create a new political balance giving every institution a much better chance of functioning properly, without constant interference, in terms of its remit and the professional training of its staff. It is not only the BA which has become a joke in poor taste. How much does the warping cost us? Who in his/her right mind and outside the upper echelons of the other political parties could possibly object? Would we not all be better off if the plethora of regulators, quasi judicial bodies, quangoes and government departments had a job to do and did just that without fear or favour?

Wild dream? The other thing is certainty of a never-ending nightmare: instead of one set of system benders we get the other set. What's the difference? A new set of spanners in the works? With the country all set to take on a globalised world, can we have a hope in hell of success if we carry on with old boy systems, friends of friends or the other set of friends of friends? More than anything else we need a solid foundation. We need reliable statistics, reliable data. We need transparency and accountability, predictable decisions following clear and known policies. We need the administration of our country to be a well-oiled machine fully at the service of each and every one of its citizens.

For the last 30 years we have been losing the race with our closest competition, making less progress than them but consoling ourselves that we have made some progress. Every government has been at great pains to make us believe that we have never been better off. What else? It has been quite true of course but never the whole truth. If we are a hair's breadth ahead of where we were yesterday, that too is progress. It is not enough. The figures show clearly that we have had a much flatter rate of climb than countries such as Greece, Spain and Portugal, which started their race way behind us, suffered the handicaps of dictatorships but have still left us far behind.

Nobody in politics except for the Greens has ever pointed out the cost of our distorted systems, the uncertainty and the lack of credibility.

Today everybody feels the pinch. Not everybody makes the connections. The opposition blames the government and the government finds excuses. The people take sides. The Greens can end this by forcing everybody to look at the whole picture. It is the ruling anti system that is the matter with us. In the two-party, one-party-government system in symbiosis with a small handful of big financiers of political parties, almost nothing can work the way it should. How could it?

How will the Greens change all this? Simply by changing the balance of power. By being there and being beholden to no one, certainly not to the financiers of the other two political parties. We owe nobody any special favours. We will simply allow the machine of government to function.

We will not be interfering and bending the rules all over the place. We have no need to, no covert lobby whispering in our ear reminding us that it is payback time. We can let the wealth of superbly-trained people in every sector of the administration to get on with their jobs. It is what business needs, and culture, and science. It is what workers, students, what professionals in every field need. It is what we all need in our daily lives. It's not rocket science. It is simply applied democracy.

Do we need a third party? Do we need air to breathe? Does this country need to unleash its full potential? If not now, when?

Dr Vassallo is chairman of Alternattiva Demokratika - The Green Party.

www.alternattiva.org.mt

www.adgozo.com