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Azzopardi admits PN media role in 2008 election
Xarabank presenter Peppi Azzopardi has admitted coaching Nationalist MP Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando in how to face former Labour leader Alfred Sant during the 2008 election’s BA press conference.
In comments to TVM journalist Daphne Cassar on breakfast show TVAM, Azzopardi said he felt Pullicino Orlando was being persecuted in the media.
He said he called to check on him, and was later giving him advice how to face Sant during a Broadcasting Authority press conference where Pullicino Orlando was issued with a temporary press card to stand in as a Media.Link journalist.
Azzopardi’s role in coaching Pullicino Orlando during the Mistra scandal was revealed in court during the sitting for a libel suit against Mediatoday managing editor Saviour Balzan, by Richard Cachia Caruana, Malta’s permanent representative to the EU.
Azzopardi also said his role as a media advisor was not limited to just the Nationalist Party, having also contributed to the formation of a code of ethics for the Labour media, and even training Labour journalists. “Nobody complained of a conflict of interest then,” Azzopardi said.
Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando revealed that the broadcaster Joe Azzopardi had been assigned by the Nationalist Party to coach him before his appearance as a ‘journalist’ in the BA conference, while testifying in a case instituted by Richard Cachia Caruana against Saviour Balzan.
In his testimony, Pullicino Orlando confirmed that he was following instructions before the 2008 elections as instructed by Cachia Caruana and former PN secretary-general Joe Saliba.
In court Pullicino Orlando was asked by Balzan’s defence lawyer Toni Abela to mention the name of the person who had coached him. Last week in an interview with Josanne Cassar, Pullicino Orlando had mentioned he had been coached without revealing who this person was.
Azzopardi hosts the Friday show Xarabank on state TV and is also one of the directors of the media company Where’s Everybody. Azzopardi has always argued that he is independent and has no political agenda.
JPO’s revelation is the first confirmation that Azzopardi is involved in rehearsing Nationalist politicians, a rumour that was never proven before.
JPO did not say if Richard Cachia Caruana or Joe Saliba had instructed Joe Azzopardi to coach JPO. Azzopardi’s critics have always accused the TV presenter of being biased in favour of the Gonzi administration.
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Pajjiz ta bla misthija sfaccata! As Cole Porter used to sing anything goes!
Abdullah alhrbi •
OMG Antoine Vella you really have given us an insight into why the Antoine Vella generation, those PN1987isti, never really sorted out the mess that needed sorting out, the cowards. If your taste in TV programmes and TV anchormen is anything to go by then the bar in 1987 was definitely set at MSI : Mediocrity Supreme and Immortal. LOL so this is your best possible world where the epitome of broadcasters is personified by a sniveler and a driveler with barely a journalistic monosynapse between them? The epitome of broadcasting is that which shields the government of the day from any flack where one particular end justifies the means. Incomparable perceptiveness and astutness on the part of the arbiter of taste and impartiality Antoine Vella!
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Hahha Hahhha araxni ha nidhaq Peppi Hahhha
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Who are the labour politicians Peppi trained?
At least we know that JPO was and he's definetly not labour.
Abdullah alhrbi •
LOL Antoine Vella
I would agree it was bad judgement on the PL's part for Azzopardi to be involved in training let alone draw up a code of ethics! Why should any journalist worth his/her salt want coaching in deception? I see Antoine Vella you hold deception in high esteem, one of the values closest to your bosom is it? Judging by the total N of people who didn't vote for the PN( = 50.7% vs PN 49.3%) Joe Azzopardi's coaching wasn't that convincing either. Well now we know why it was so easy to see that the Prime minister was confabulating and waffling on the honoraria issue, the truth signals were not flashing brightly.
Apparently our little Peppi 'Santoro' Azzopardi is also the local high priest of Impression management. What Joey Azzopardi can't ever do is pass himself off as the epitome of impartiality, seems he doesn't follow his own advice on that one.
Igor P. Shuvalov •
There is a great difference in training journalists and coaching a politician at such a sensitive time.
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@Antoine Vella
"I don't agree that Peppi Azzopardi should have trained Labour journalists. they don't deserve any help"
And why is this so?
Now, whether YOU are in agreement on not has absolutely no significance.
Peppi Azzopardi has now confirmed what we have known all along.
Yet, his company is allowed by PBS to air current affairs programmes.
Can the Broadcasting Authority give a ruling in this case i.e. whether there is any conflict of interest?[
[Where it matters BA has very recently shown that it can convene in 48 hours].
Micheal Bonanno •
The PL asked Peppi Azzopardi take a make up The Code of Ethics for Journalists. The PL didn't ask Peppi Azzopardi to coach MP's how to tell "the truth". Quite a difference, Mr. Antoine Vella. As for the PL criticizing Peppi, why not? Just watch him interview Joseph Muscat and then Peppi interviewing Gonzi. There's a hell of a difference!
Another difference in the way Peppi interviews. Just watch the pre-election of 2008 interview with Dr. Alfred Sant. You'll see that Peppi was all out with questions full of booby traps, and loaded questions. Then watch the same present interviewing Gonzi. You'll see quite a difference. It's more like a tete-a-tete between friends than an interview, not like that with Dr. Alfred Sant. More of an interrogation than an interview.
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I don't agree that Peppi Azzopardi should have trained Labour journalists. they don't deserve any help.
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Why didn't they ask Saviour Balzan to train them?
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It's disgraceful that Labour should keep attacking Peppi Azzopardi and then turn to him for help.
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Peppi you can fool some people some of the time but you cannot fool all the people all the time.
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Heqq - can you blame him? Peppi has to sing loud and long for such a lavish supper.
