David’s final Thake-down: Online radio station shut down

PN candidate and popular radio host David Thake has shut down his personal online radio station in anger at people who “have tried to shut him up”.

“This week, I will be shutting down Switch Radio,” he said in a tweet. “That experience was a lesson. People will try and shut you up…”

Thake set up Switch Radio last year after the Nationalist Party stopped his political drive-time show ‘Taghna Lkoll’ from being aired on Radio 101 as part of its policy not to have its election candidates on air in the run-up to an election.

The PN later made a U-turn and allowed Thake and other candidates back on air in the wake of widespread protests by Radio 101 listeners.

During last month’s general election, Thake run a close race in both the 12th and the 8th districts, but narrowly failed to get elected to Parliament at his first time of asking.

When the PN came to strategise on which seats to put up for casual election, Thake found himself with three possible routes into Parliament – if leader Simon Busuttil decided to abandon the 12th district or if either deputy leader Beppe Fenech Adami or PN Whip David Agius decided to abandon the eighth. However, all three MPs decided to keep those seats, blocking off Thake’s route to Parliament.

Thake subsequently cancelled his Radio 101 show ‘Taghna Lkoll’, which was renowned for his on-air telephone calls to Labour officials and supporters.

His tweet announcing the shutting down of Switch Radio was derided by Neville Gafa, a health ministry official who has been accused of masterminding a racket involving the issuance of medical visas to Libyans. 

“You won’t be missed at all. Hiding behind the microphone. Get a hobby,” Gafa tweeted.

Thake responded by bringing up the medical scandal, prompting Gafa to mockingly suggest that the PN candidate might have been able to get the votes of the Libyans.