Hidden agendas

There is nothing wrong with having agendas.

But it is important that before continuing, we set the record straight. We declare from the outset that this newspaper is not owned by a politician and has an independent editorial policy.

Furthermore, the author of this leader does not have any contractual agreement with any politician, apart from a limited temporary one on a matter which is related to avian biology.

But yes, we support the policies of certain politicians. As is traditional in a liberal and democratic media. The Times for a very long time supported Guido De Marco, The Independent on Sunday, Michael Frendo, and the list goes on.

Now back to the point.

One thing is certain - the furore created by Alterra’s communication press has gone way too far. It proves beyond doubt that Alterra and its local loudspeakers are bad losers - very bad indeed. It also confirms that some people think they are beyond reproach.

The same communications strategy used to decimate the reputation of Guido De Marco in 1996, Maurice Calleja in 1994 and Alfred Sant, is now being applied to the Finance Minister, John Dalli.

There is no reason why the media should genuflect whenever certain people opt to pass disingenuous comments, although this has been the tradition so far.

This Alterra communication strategy is attempting to do something far worse, it is trying to give the impression that the privatisation process is flawed and does not have the support of the Government Cabinet, which is hogwash.

The perpetrators of this damaging strategy are getting so desperate that they have aligned themselves with journalists like Glenn Bedingfield of Zeppi l-Hafi fame when only recently they scorned and ridiculed him.

There are many adjectives to describe such antics.

Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adami has already been clear about the MIA bid.

He should now intervene to ensure that the government and its spin-doctors speak with one voice.

Spin on Europe

The spin on Europe has unfortunately been restricted to giving information to two or three journalists. This is unacceptable. The Department of Information has been reduced to a typing office.

Yesterday’s revelation that Malta would, after all, get a fishing zone of 40km is a case in point. The report was based on a meeting held by the Malta-EU steering and action committee. But why was only one journalist informed of this?

The government’s press office, the DOI, might as well exile itself, because the government is not interested in seeing it organise competent briefing sessions.

The same argument applies to the revelation about Maltese as an official language. Why does MaltaToday have to discover such a thing from its Brussels contacts?

We appeal to the government to address all the media and not small segments of the press. This is the way forward. Until now, the government press strategy on Europe has been meagre and limited. From what we know, recent steps taken to rope in an ‘outsider’ will not help to improve this. On the contrary it will continue to worsen the government’s public relations disaster.