Work to lure

It is the sacrosanct duty of all broadcasters and writers, whether they are journalists, columnists or presenters, to do their homework. Liberalisation of the media has meant that this quality is, alas, sadly lacking in some of us.

Let us take two random news items from this week's bulletins - the near-tragedy of the helicopter ditched in the North Sea, and the violent protest at the Lyster Barracks by illegal immigrants.

For the first item, we discovered that there were at least one/ two/four Maltese people involved. Some radio and television stations gave one name, some gave two, and others gave just a number.

Regarding the second issue, some sources said that Tunisian nationals wanted to be repatriated, others said that they did not want to be sent back home.

I also noticed an item in several foreign news bulletins about a topic that was mentioned in passing some time ago, but since then has, to my knowledge, been totally ignored. Yet again, nobody bothered to pick up the latest details.

Last September, some media informed us that the local police force were about to be equipped with "non-lethal" Taser stun guns. This was around the time that CBC news of Vancouver had aired a clip of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekenski being needlessly Tasered by the Mounties at Vancouver airport.

The footage, shot by a citizen journalist, indicated clearly that Dziekenski, who later died, had not in fact, attacked the officers.

Later in the same month, a verdict of 'accidental death' was lodged after Iman Morales fell to his death from the fire escape of a building in Bedford-Stuyvesant, where he had been standing naked and waving a metal pole, after he had been Tasered. Mr Morales died from injuries sustained in the fall, which would not have happened had he not been incapacitated by the current emitted by the Taser.

Now it turns out that this 'safe' alternative to guns, meant to 'subdue' criminals, has in fact caused the death of 400 people since 2001, in Canada and the US alone. Sometimes, apparently, police officers could not distinguish between diabetic hypoglycaemia and substance abuse. In both cases, the use of a Taser is not indicated.

Chillingly, the marketing bumph on the Taser site reads: "Who says safety can't be stylish?" Incidentally Jack Cover, the Nasa scientist who had originally invented the Taser to combat hijackings and riots, died on February 7. The name of the weapon came from the story of 'Tom Swift's electric rifle', which had fascinated Cover as a child.

I sent a query to the police department about the latest local developments on the issue. I have a couple of acknowledgements but, so far, there is nothing concrete to report.

• Most cooks worth their salt know that courgettes, zucchini, and marrows are basically the same fruit, except for shape and size. Indeed, they may be taken from the same plant, at different stages of growth. It is therefore painful to see inverted commas used with courgettes when the rest of the ingredients in a recipe are in Maltese. The same goes for when a person being interviewed mentioned faqqiegħ several times, and yet the interviewer kept asking him about mushrooms.

• Search engines and social networking sites make it relatively easy to track down people, or at least, information about them. This is the least people can do before interviewing someone, or inviting them as guests on a programme.

Imagine inviting Charles Abela Mizzi and arrogantly asking him, without any hint of a smile to indicate that irony is present, "Can you tell us anything about broadcasting?" Imagine inviting Trevor Zahra to a programme and saying, "I am fascinated by your book, which Ġorġ Peresso is currently serialising on Radju Malta. Tell me... would you consider writing for children?"

The same thing happened fairly recently in a discussion programme about Carnival. Davinia Galea, CEO of the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts, was asked whether she could tell us "anything" (xi ħaġa) about this year's activities.

• One Television will be broadcasting a new series of programmes in the Lilliput series in summer. Lilliput Sketch will be presented by the familiar, well-loved trio of ex-head of school Mary Anne Zammit, Mariah Mifsud Bonnici and Ruth Frendo.

• TVM's ninth 118 series is set to go on air as from the first Thursday in March, at 6.10 p.m. This magazine will now have a new host, Xandru Grech, who will be meeting Malta's style gurus in various fields. The series will include 118 Wines Travel. This will begin with a soupcon of France, on the wine trails to Burgundy, Champagne and Bordeaux.

• Some months ago, I had written to Roberto Giacobbo of Voyager (Rai 2) to point out that, contrary to what he had said, the oldest free-standing monuments in the world are in Malta. It is good to see that the relevant research was undertaken, and that the crew did in fact come to Malta.

The resulting documentary was aired earlier on this month, now available on You Tube ( http://tinyurl.com/aj3dnw and http://tinyurl.com/acjncx ).

• PBS informs us that Chiara has begun her pre-Eurovision promo-tour this week, with What if We... in Athens, Greece, on February 18, having been a guest on the Greek national final on ERT, the Greek national TV station.

television@timesofmalta.com