Abela's sponsored FB video gets ethics commissioner´s blessing

The prime minister did not breach ethics over a sponsored video uploaded on social media over a year ago, the Commissioner for Standards in Public Life ruled.

Independent election candidate Arnold Cassola sparked the commissioner's report on grounds that Robert Abela was promoting himself through taxpayers' money, in breach of the guidelines proposed by former standards commissioner George Hyzler.

But the current commissioner - former chief justice Joseph Azzopardi - informed Cassola that his complaint against Abela's sponsored video did not merit an investigation since the clip was not intentionally produced as an advert so it could not qualify as one.

Cassola took exception to the decision, saying it set a precedent for any government politician to spend public money under the guise of informing people of their work.

The issue revolves around a one-minute video clip published on the Malta Government Facebook page on October 7, 2022.

It shows Abela in Prague, speaking about the outcome of a meeting between 44 state leaders on the rising energy prices. In the video, he explains the need for concrete decisions to be taken internationally to bring down energy prices.

"The Maltese people will not be impacted by these decisions because, over the past months, we took the strategic decision as a government to absorb the rising costs of utility bills and fuels," the prime minister said.

"Naturally, if solutions are found and prices decrease internationally, then the [Maltese] state will benefit from that too. We will be saving money which we will then reroute to more diversified projects."

The video had no other shots, music, graphics or visual effects and just showed Abela appearing to be speaking to a reporter.

In his decision, Standards Commissioner Azzopardi said that despite being sponsored, the video could not be construed as an advert for Abela, since it was simply a clip of him informing the public about the outcome of the meeting.

It was not intentionally produced as an advert and the public has a right to be informed of the outcome of such meetings, he said.

Azzopardi highlighted how Hyzler's 'Guidelines on Government Advertising and Promotional Material' distinguishes between an 'advert' and 'promotional material'.

An advert is a "boosted or sponsored post on social media", he said, whereas promotional material is "videos, graphics, documents and audio clips that are produced for circulation to the public by electronic means".

This one, therefore, should be treated as an advert, because it was sponsored and adverts are precluded from showing the names or faces of ministers, he said.

But despite this video being both sponsored and showing Abela's face, Azzopardi decided it still did not qualify as an advert because it was not specifically produced as one and the prime minister was relaying information of public interest to the people.

"The use of this sponsored post is not a breach of ethics because the prime minister delivered information of genuine public interest and the expense was minimal," he said.

The government spent €100 to sponsor the video.

Cassola was not happy about the decision and in a statement on Tuesday he said it sets a precedent for any incumbent prime minister, minister or other politicians to justify spending public money "to advertise their work as ministers, since they are 'informing' the public about their work".

"What is the use of having a publicly funded Department of Information when it can be substituted by paid adverts," he said.

"Moreover, [the decision says that] since the price of the advert is low - €100 - this is not a problem. Is it OK for a politician to use public money for 200 different adverts worth €100 each? One also wonders at what amount - €1,000, €10,000? - does using public money to publicise oneself in a single advert become a problem."

This is not the first time the blurred lines between information of public interest and the promotion of politicians stirred controversy.

In 2021, the former Standards Commissioner found that adverts published by then-minister Carmelo Abela breached ethics because they were intended to boost his image.

The printed advertisements appeared in national newspapers and depicted Abela accompanied by slogans.

That campaign had cost taxpayers more than €7,000 and could not be considered to be informative or of interest to the public to merit being paid for through public funds, the Standards Commissioner had found.