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In the 1960s, a communist dissident had a brilliant method of criticising his government. He would write an article praising the government and a week later he would run an article criticising the same opinion.
They would say Mieczyslaw Rakowski would breathe in your ear. Rakowski’s readers would understand his message and would simply take his arguments and flip them round to appreciate them.
Prof. Edward Debono surely missed the lateral thinking behind this one. It would have been so much more colourful than his puerile and nauseating six thinking hats lectures.
Today, in 2005, the thought that we have the freedom to write is measured by the level of mediocrity and personal insanity.
Press freedom in Malta is controlled at all levels and when it is not, there are the courts to worry about.
Those who are willing to cross the line – and this newspaper is a case in point – is guaranteed a disproportionate number of court sittings in an environment that is surely only second to a Mongolian flea market.
And when the courts are unable to help out by nipping the stories in the bud, the next level of censorship surely will come from commercial pressures.
Take a typical example: McDonald’s has never advertised in this newspaper. They cannot digest the analytical articles and the editorial line on junk food and therefore they choose to put their money elsewhere where people are less discerning and do not mind if their kids eat junk.
You see, our Health minister draws a line when it comes to cigarette smoke but next to nothing about cholesterol and additives in junk food.
This is perfectly acceptable in a free market economy. You do not advertise cigarettes in a health club or voodoo dolls in a seminary.
There are few options left when you have a fine story and history needs to be revised desperately.
So for example, if I am informed by a credible, willing informant dying to stand up and be counted, about how a former Prime Minister renowned for his enduring egotism and ruthless politics was the father of sinister proposals, what is the next step?
The next step is to ask the former Prime Minister if these proposals are true. And if he fails to reply to the questions what next?
Publish and be damned could be one way of looking at it.
In another corner of Europe where the press do not have to beg their Home Affairs Minister to visit detainees in camps, a ‘no comment’ is considered to be a comment.
But then Europe do not get all their journalists together to sign a petition to a Minister, because most of the time, such kind of ministers would have long resigned and disappeared.
Yet those of you who have followed the way the courts in Malta work and function must realise that the Press Act is there to suppress the dissemination of news and analysis. It favours those who camouflage their actions in secrecy, no comment or simple denial.
In court one comes face to face with the greediness of some lawyers and the benevolence of others – the magistrates.
Freedom of the press in Malta is a farce.
It will never be otherwise unless, others follow the path of this newspaper and disentangle themselves from their heavy-handed shareholders, be they businessmen, political parties or the Church.
For example at In-Nazzjon, everyone is free to scribble adulatory snippets about Gonzi, but not free to question his policies or to publish the words of angry dissidents.
At l-Orizzont everyone is free to give thumbs up to Tony Zarb and Alfred Sant and thumbs down to guess who, but be warned, not a word against the GWU and Labour.
At the Malta Independent, well, they are not that bad, but then think not of stepping on the toes of Bertu Mizzi or one of the major shareholders of that newspaper.
And The Times, well, they try very hard not question the family that has dominated the politics of this newspaper for the last thirty years.
My experiences with the law in recent weeks have led me into three different arenas.
The first one came with Sina Bugeja, who warned editors that we were publishing adverts with the pictures of men only and excluding women.
Well, it is no longer lawful for a man to advertise his image in a vacancy or the promotion of a product. We call it gender discrimination or better still gender bias. Worst of all it is illegal. And the editor is responsible for this.
The last thing we need on our plate is a Taliban check on advert content and to confirm if the theme picture offers humans with a pair of testicles or fallopian tubes.
This gender terrorism is making it a crime to adulate the beauty and allure of the female. From now on we as editors are obliged to insert mug shots of ugly men with dead pan women.
I am lost what to do when faced with a picture of an effeminate male or a tomboyish female. And does this gender legal hurdle apply to primates as well?
Where are we taking all this to? Is this country losing its senses? There is this obsession to control everything.
Visit all the restaurants and bars and they will tell you about the health inspectors that are enforcing regulations that are just what these small hardworking folk need in such a depressed market. I wonder. Where is the GRTU on this one?
Now, what was I saying?
The second issue was the libel action by Bertu Mizzi against me as editor for having published a piece by Harry Vassallo which was simply a rendition of what Bertu Mizzi said on a TV programme. Needless to say, Mr Mizzi, one of Dom Mintoff’s fondest businessmen is angry that I had the gall to allow such an opinion be published.
I have no reason to keep anyone’s pen buried just because Bertu Mizzi is traditionally not talked about.
Once vilified by Eddie Fenech Adami in a mass meeting and later hand picked by this government to advise Malta on the Dar Malta sale, Bertu Mizzi is yet another chap who would not mind to see MaltaToday change very much in the same way the Tigné promontory evolved into a concrete jungle.
The third issue that landed me in court was the prosecution by the police on the advice of the Lotto department under the former Minister of Finance of all the editors of all the newspapers apart from In-Nazzjon (what a surprise) over the publication of a ridiculous press release for Oracle Casino.
Well, somehow, in the law, the content of the press release which was as earth-shattering as the sudden birth of a dung beetle was an illegal act. Unknowingly to the press the promotion of gambling in a press release is illegal.
It is perfectly acceptable to have a bill board of Casino di Venezia or adverts of gambling in Malta this month. It is also okay to have illegal slot machines all over the Island, but for the politically appointed Gaming Authority Chairman Joe Zammit Maempel and the priority driven police an insignificant advertorial appearing in all the press is tantamount to a very serious crime. Somehow, no one realised that this was an offence, hence its publication in all newspapers. So I technically face imprisonment because of a press release no bigger than my thumb in length. Perhaps a prison sentence is not a bad idea after all. I could meet a few interesting and colourful ‘criminals’ at Kordin and catch up with some lost sleep.
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