Updated | PN turns down Budget ads after Broadcasting Authority pulls them off PBS

Media.LInk refuses €10,000 in Budget ads after BA pulls them off state broadcaster • PN leader Simon Busuttil hits out at Joseph Muscat for 'wasting public funds on blatant propaganda'  • Government accuses Busuttil of censuring Budget from PN media viewers

Nationalist Party media house Media.Link Communications has rejected a €10,000 offer by the government to broadcast promotion videos about the 2016 Budget.

The ads were pulled off the air by PBS “in the format that they were in” after the Broadcasting Authority argued that they contained false information.

“Despite this ban from the Broadcasting Authority, the government is still arrogantly trying to broadcast its promotion videos on private TV stations,” Opposition leader Simon Busuttil said, calling on the BA not to allow the government to broadcast the videos on Labour-owned One TV.

“Instead of wasting public funds on such blatant propaganda, they should tackle the problems faced by cancer patients whose €3,000 monthly medications are not on the government’s formulary list.”

“Despite the government’s substantial financial offer, the PN has refused to broadcast such bare-faced political propaganda on its media,” Busuttil said in comments at Madrid, where he has travelled to attend a conference organised by the European People’s Party. “The Prime Minister has now also tried to buy the Nationalist Party, a confirmation of his political philosophy that money is the be all and end all, and that everybody and everything is for sale. However, the Nationalist Party is not for sale.”

Busuttil ‘censuring Budget from viewers’

In a reaction, the government said that Busuttil is denying his party media’s viewers the chance to inform themselves about Budget-announced measures.

“Busuttil’s censorship is a clear sign that he is worried about the Budget, which includes several measures that the public will enjoy,” the government said.

It also pointed out that the BA’s complaint related solely to the broadcasting of one advert, that has since been amended according to the authority’s directive.