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Matthew Vella
Is it simply churlish repartee or just the silver-tongued communication strategy with which Brussels hopes to woo its supporters?
EU Communications boss Claus Sørensen, who runs the European Commission’s directorate-general for relations with the media, has taken umbrage at MaltaToday editor Saviour Balzan’s dismissal of the Commission as a ‘bitch’.
Months after MaltaToday first broke the news of a media contact awarded to Media.Link, a company directly owned by the PN, Sørensen has written saying the award of the contract was carried out according to normal rules and that subsidiary company Informa had signed to a commitment on impartiality “in order to avoid a conflict of interest”.
The Commission recently decided not to renew the contract awarded to PN communications company Media.Link after taking into account “sensitivities that were brought to attention by the Maltese media.”
Editor Saviour Balzan, in his commentary of Sunday 4 June, wrote the Commission had stated it saw no conflict of interest in the award of the contract, despite the contract requirements demanding that the contractor had no direct political links. “But the Commission, as we do not know, is a bitch. It only sees a conflict of interest when it is of interest to itself,” Balzan wrote.
In his reaction, Sørensen has written in a letter carrying little of the eloquence expected from the Dane whose mission is to bring Europe and its citizens closer:
“Given that you very politely characterise the Commission as a ‘bitch’ maybe you would allow the ‘bitch’ to answer back,” Sørensen’s opening lines read, in a letter carrying the official stamp of the European Commission.
Self-deprecating? Good to know Brussels’s bureaucrats have a sense of humour.
But even that has its limits. Sørensen has taken issue with the editorial cartoon depicting head of representation Joanna Drake expressing a positive verdict over the media review service, with the words “I was very pleased with the PN running the service”.
Drake had said she found the service satisfactory and had nothing to complain about. Sørensen, in a bout of semantic-wrestling, found issue with Drake being depicted as having been “pleased” (rather than being satisfied of course) with the service offered by the PN-owned company.
No need to be so bitchy
Following the announcement of the termination of the contract, Labour MEP Joseph Muscat said Media.Link was chosen after the Commission entered into discussions with tenderers, when it found no bidder had been eligible at first.
He had personally told Commissioner Margot Wallström the award of the contract had been “unacceptable”.
The Commission had stood by its claim that Media.Link, which is headed by PN secretary-general Joe Saliba and deputy Prime Minister Tonio Borg, was chosen on the basis of best value for money, saying the fact it was owned by a political party “was not considered to be a conflict of interests by the technical services of the Commission rules”.
In November 2005, a Commission spokesperson said that excluding Media.Link “was considered as unjustified with respect to the public procurement regulations”, despite the service contract laying down that contractors must avoid conflicts which could arise out of “political or national affinity.”
An independent audit into the tender award was later launched in January after MEPs raised the issue in the European Parliament.
The audit, launched in January 2006, was never carried out after the four audit firms approached by the Commission in its restricted call for tenders did not accept.
MEP Joseph Muscat said two of the four firms approached by the Commission – KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers – refused on the grounds that they had links with the PN. The other firms approached were BDO and Ernst & Young.
The audit was expected to be completed by 30 April. Just two days after MaltaToday enquired about the outcome of the audit, the Commission announced on Thursday 1 June it would not renew the media review contract.
Labour MEP Joseph Muscat has said that “awarding such a contract to a political party is unacceptable in a democratic country. You cannot have a major player in politics providing a service requiring impartiality. It’s a case of political sensitivity – in this case it was the apex of tastelessness.”
The PN stood to earn EUR565,000 (Lm244,000) over five years to provide a daily media review to the Commission’s representation in Ta’ Xbiex.
The contract will now terminate in July and in September, having earned Media.Link, the parent company, over EUR109,500 (Lm47,412), although the contract was expected to be renewed according to performance.
mvella@mediatoday.com.mt
Links: www.maltatoday.com.mt/2006/06/04/t1.html
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