Updated 8pm with European Parliament statement
Alex Agius Saliba has asked the European Parliament to investigate what he says is a misuse of EP funds to promote Roberta Metsola criticising the government.
The PL MEP is claiming Lovin Malta used funds procured through the so-called Ewropej campaign to publish Metsola's comments about a strike at the University of Malta, despite that being unrelated to her work at the European Parliament.
Both Agius Saliba and Metsola are candidates in the upcoming European elections. Metsola is also president of the European Parliament.
Lovin Malta and Malta Today form part of the Ewropej 2024 reporting project, which provides them with funding in exchange for reporting about MEPs, their work and EU-related issues more generally.
Agius Saliba says reporting on Metsola's criticism of the government is a misuse of that funding.
"Nowhere do the objectives of the procurement process indicate they shall promote the re-election campaign of incumbent MEPs," he said.
"This would provide an unfair advantage over other candidates. The objectives of this funding are to provide non-partisan information on the forthcoming elections, such as on candidates’ viewpoints on European matters, and to report on the legislative work done by MEPs in the European Parliament."
Both media houses issued statements following Agius Saliba's allegations, saying they have editorial freedom to report on the European Parliament as well as domestic issues in which MEPs are active, in the run-up to the June MEP elections.
Online searches indicate that the media houses have used the Ewropej fund to highlight Maltese MEPs' take on local issues in the past.
Lovin Malta, for instance, gave prominence to Agius Saliba's call to investigate foodstuff oligopolies in Malta and his comments about the Gaza war, with both those articles marked as being funded through the EP fund.
Last year, the outlet also published comments by PL MEP Josianne Cutajar blasting misogyny in Malta as part of its Ewropej series.
In a statement published to its website following Agius Saliba's complaint, Lovin Malta said nobody from Metsola's team or the European Parliament had been involved in their decision to report her statement about the university strike.
"We simply wrote about it because we felt it was newsworthy, and we classified it as under the Ewropej category because we considered her statement to be pertinent to the category," the website said in an article titled 'setting the record straight'.
Malta Today also issued its own rebuttal to Agius Saliba's complaint, noting that it had "extensively reported Agius Saliba’s raising of domestic issues such as his recent call to investigate foodstuff oligopolies in Malta."
Agius Saliba said the PN and "other critics" were quick to point out irregularities in the use of funds by local ministers but said nothing about the use of European funds to aid Metsola’s campaign.
“I will ensure that the use of EU funds is scrutinised to the same level of detail as the PN expects for the use of national funds," he said.
The Labour MEP also accused his political rival of abusing of her position as European Parliament president to push her own political agenda.
"Metsola recently visited Portugal and used her designation as President of the European Parliament to support the incumbent conservative government’s re-election campaign," he said.
"In another visit to a member state in her official capacity, Roberta Metsola chose to only expose the work of right-leaning MEPs. Funding for the Office of the President of the European Parliament should be used fairly and objectively to deliver in the interests of the European Parliament and not to promote the personal campaigns of the incumbent President."
Media freedom core to Ewropej tender: European Parliament
In a statement on Wednesday, the European Parliament said the aim of media grant projects such as Ewropej was to "contribute to a wide public debate and engage with citizens ahead of the forthcoming European Elections".
Media participating in such projects is required to provide "regular, reliable, pluralistic and non-partisan information related to the European elections and the political and legislative work of the European Parliament", it said, adding that "media freedom is core to this tender".
Participating media have the freedom to engage their audiences in line with their editorial policies while respecting political balance and EU values.
"The European Parliament services do not influence or interfere in the editorial line of the projects awarded these media grants. Media projects across all the member states of the EU were awarded grants in a politically neutral manner following a public call for applications, and based on selection criteria that were also made public.
"Media also undertake to be independent of any public or private instruction, pressure or request – stemming, for example, from any EU institution, EU Member State or any other State or institution – in all matters concerning editorial choices (including content) concerning the action activities."