I had the interesting experience of attending the Xarabank programme on Friday 14 March, the subject being the “General Election”.

I was scheduled to ask a question but after sitting through the “show” I really felt that I did not want to take part, so kept quiet.

Having some experience of presentation and production I was impressed with the facilities and the studio; the technical team was excellent – they were nearly all ex-Super One.

It is just such a shame that such excellence is used to abuse the very essence of good media coverage.

The General Secretaries of the four political parties were invited to give their views on the General Election in theory, but clearly the real intention was to ambush and humiliate Jason Micallef, the MLP’s general secretary.

From the very first moment, the body language, face, voice and style of Peppi Azzopardi was that of a playground bully. The harassment caused by constant interruptions, the deliberate posture of disrespect, compared with the almost contrived respect he accorded the other parties’ secretaries, especially Joe Saliba, was all too obvious.

Whether the presence of some infantile hecklers who targeted Jason Micallef was planned or not is a moot point, especially as one of the Xarabank staff seemed annoyed with them and tried to quieten them down, but their presence and activities added to the spiteful ambiance. The mob hysteria was augmented by the vociferous presence of other members of an imbalanced panel, who, rightly or wrongly, clearly believed they had reason to target Jason Micallef for perceived wrongs done to them by the MLP.

Mr Azzopardi does himself and his media skills no favours by playing to the lowest common denominator, and setting up “target” participants in his show to be surrounded by hostility. In the long run it surely undermines his own credibility and standing and is a definite waste of his talents.

Surely he is experienced and confident enough to be able to stand firm in an evenly balanced presentation, instead of resorting to such obvious “dirty trick” policies.

As it was, on the whole, Jason Micallef conducted himself with no little dignity in the face of the hounding, and although he was harried into making some questionable answers, he came out looking the better human being than most of those around him – certainly better than the bullying presenter.

An interesting exercise in media observation and anthropology.

Michael Turner