Press freedom in Malta is deteriorating – Reporters Without Borders index
Published:
February 14, 2015 at 2:10pm
Press freedom in Malta is deteriorating. What most people don’t understand is that our position on the index is measured through actual events and not perception.
Each time the police take action against a journalist, for example – even if it is at the request of an individual who feels himself or herself aggrieved by something that has been written – press freedom in Malta is marked down.
It is not just having criminal defamation on the statute books that is a problem; it is the propensity of the police to act on it, especially at the request of politicians or other officials.
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http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2015-02-13/local-news/Maltese-media-one-of-least-free-in-the-EU-index-suggests-situation-in-Malta-deteriorating-6736130562
How can we, the clients at the receiving end of the press, fight this?
We swamp the Police and courts with libel prosecutions.
Two things you should do.
1. Raise hell every time something or someone is suppressed.
2. Ask questions and hold your government to account.
Muscat tweeted his support for Renzi’s call for UN intervention in Libya, saying Malta will do its bit. The tweet was in Italian. It was aimed at Renzi. All the main newspapers reported this. None of them included a direct quote by Muscat in response to their question.
The prime minister believe himself to be unaccountable. Hold him to account.
Then this index is undoubtedly wrong. Press freedom is not measured by the number of court cases against journalists. This should be styled the press anarchy index. Press freedom is not a lack of judicial procedures.
[Daphne – Harassment of journalists by the police at the request of officials and politicians, David, is most definitely something that impacts negatively on press freedom.]
Pretty bizarre considering the Prime Minister is a journalist himself.
Super One reporters are propagandists, not journalists.
The police do not act only at the request of politicians and officials but also at the instigation of a hunters’ organisation like the FKNK who then have to find a formula to worm their way out of their self-imposed problem
It seems that everyone has forgotten that we had a leading minister George Vella telling us that we should start to control the media and this was soon after Labour was elected to power.
First and foremost it is the media themselves that should fight for their right to freedom of expression by not allowing themselves to be frightened into submission by the government.
Very recently when Manwel Mallia was forced to resign, an angry Prime Minister said in Parliament that he is going to target Opposition MPs one by one.
It was a serious threat in a democracy, yet it was hardly reported in the media.
If this government is getting away with murder, then each and every one of us has a duty to speak.
This government either buys silence and consent or else bullies into submission those who speak out. That is precisely why this blog is so popular – because it is the only media outlet which refuses to be bullied by this government.