In defence of a colleague

I do not think that PBS/TVM are shining examples of perfection, but neither is MaltaToday, or any other medium, for that matter.

What I can safely say is that the PBS newsroom under head of news Reno Bugeja is infinitely much better and more fair than it was under its previous head of news.

And that comment is based on what I saw years ago, and on what I see today. 

The reason that I am standing up to support my colleague is not to suck up to him. He knows all too very well that we have had our differences of opinion.

But I cannot stand the objections and complaints made to the Broadcasting Authority by the Nationalist party against Reno Bugeja over ‘unfair reporting’.

TV audiences know Reno Bugeja as a broadcaster, he is very well researched, he is fair and he does not mince his words or condition himself, and yet his appointment as head of news was greeted with derision by the PN.

Reno has worked as a journalist at PBS for countless years, most of the heads of news who existed before his appointment were chosen from outside PBS.  He has always refused to climb up the ladder, preferring to lie low and stick to his job as a journalist.

I know Reno, he has a mind of his own.  He is solid and does not like transgressing into murky waters.  But he knows when a story is a story and he has a good appraisal of what is news.

This week he even refused to report what the Prime Minister had to say when visiting Switzerland, saying that Joseph Muscat had said nothing new.

When some weeks back I was involved in the spring hunting referendum campaign, he would stop me in my tracks when I complained verbally about no or poor reporting of the Shout anti-hunting campaign.

“I said the same things to the hunters, you are saying nothing new!” was his reply.

He was friggin right.

The Nationalist party, like any other political party, are doing themselves a disservice if they continue to see red where there is no red. And they are being infinitely unfair in trying to demonise Reno Bugeja.

Today at PBS, there is much less interference than there was in the past.  That there is interference is clear, but I can say hand on heart that there is more respect for what the host and the journalist have to say.

When Lou Bondi, now derided by all those who held him in high esteem for his Nationalist sympathies, was criticised for being blatantly one sided, the PN would say nothing. On the contrary, they encouraged it. They obviously never complained.

Today they are attempting to put Reno Bugeja in a pigeonhole and label him as a collaborator of Castille.  He is not. Bugeja heads a team of journalists who surely cannot be labelled rabid Labourites. Actually, they are probably the opposite, they include Ruth Amaira, Mario Xuereb, Keith Demicoli, Sergio Mallia and Mario Micallef.  

To label individuals is our national pastime.

TVM news bulletins and discussion programmes, when compared to the past, are at their best position ever in years.

If we really want to ensure that TVM as a State medium reflects the interests of society and offers a new service which respects the truth and the intelligence of its viewers, then we must strive hard to nurture journalists who have more respect for themselves than for their political peers.

At 59, Reno Bugeja never sought to suck up to his peers, he kept a low profile and he made it known that he had a mind of his own.

The Nationalist party should be honest enough to accept the fact that with TimesTalk, Reporter, Xarabank and Dissett there has never been a more balanced spectrum of questioning, debating and angles to news, than ever before.

Surely less biased and partisan than the time of Lou Bondi and Norman Vella, two hosts who really did not need to convince anyone of their incredible bias.  At least Norman Vella found refuge in the PN. Bondi, with all his airs, ended up in the arms of Joseph Muscat.

That State TV needs to make changes and improve, is clear, but I think that the Nationalist party needs to understand that the changes that need to happen should start off by excluding the interests of the political parties and putting the audience at the centre of all reforms.

That is only part of the equation, there is little doubt in my mind, that the national broadcaster will make leaps and bounds when the broadcasters who work there know that they are not being watched by the political parties.

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Piju Camilleri, one of the late Lorry Sant’s cronies, must be wondering how strange life has become. He appears happy with the objections of the environment groups to the development of a University in the Zonqor point area.  

Apart from the greens, he has the most to lose if the government goes ahead with the project at Zonqor.

I cannot forget Piju Camilleri – in 1985 I watched as he, together with other illustrious beasts, beat up a posse of young environmentalists who challenged the government’s decision to dish out green belts for the development of housing schemes.  

Camilleri was not only a crony, he was a thug and a developer and combined his work at the Planning Areas Permits Board and Works Division with his business of corruption and coercing others to give him land.

He was investigated for his role in land deal corruption and also in the disappearance of Lino Cauchi, Lorry Sant’s accountant. Cauchi was found in a well in Buskett, dead of course, and, literally, cut up!

Camilleri gets on with life, we don’t.

I do not believe that a University should be built on ODZ (outside development zone). Last year Joseph Muscat in an interview told me that if had to choose between a €100 million project and saving a valley, he would choose the valley.

Well, I guess it was an exercise in sophistry.

If there is one interesting angle to this American University story, it is that the Piju Camilleris of this world will be losing out.

At least to a certain extent. 

I think it is pertinent to ask how Piju Camilleri acquired this land in this area in the first place.  I would very much like to know.  Because the angle to the story, with all due respect to The Times, is not how much the affected land owners are being paid in compensation, or that the government has capped the compensation for the land, but whether they deserve to be paid in the first place.

And I guess this discussion would not have arisen if we did not have to face another awful decision that will eat away at more of our virgin land.

It also comes as too close to last month’s referendum result, in which the electorate so strongly called on the government to sensitise itself to environmental concerns.