The appointment of a new head of news at Public Broadcasting Services should be based on meritocracy, NGO Repubblika president Robert Aquilina said Friday, as the NGO complained it has never been invited to take part in any PBS programme for the last two years.

The new head of news should be a competent person that serves the public, and not the government or Prime Minister of the day. The country deserves public broadcasting without political interference.

There are journalists with integrity who can fill up the post, including some PBS journalists, Aquilina said.

Standing at the entrance of the PBS complex in Guardamangia, with a banner with the word “censura” (censorship), Aqulina said that the PBS winter schedule will be starting on Monday without a head of news.

Norma Saliba resigned a few weeks after what were reported to be divergences of opinion with her superiors, and her replacement is still to be named.

Aquilina lamented that there is little information on the winter schedule. Unlike previous years, it is only tonight that the public is going to be made aware of some of the programmes that are going to be broadcast as from next week.

He said that many discussion programmes which deaslt with important subjects and carried out investigative work have been removed along the years from the national broadcasting station, whilst those that remained were put on another channel owned by the station to reach fewer people. This was done to eliminate discussion in Malta, so that the Maltese people do not get to know what is going on.

Aquilina said that from the latest report published by the broadcasting authority, it shows that this second channel’s viewership is far less that the main channels. Aquilina said that from these results one can conclude that the programmes were moved on this channel for this very reason.

He said PBS has the duty to voice all opinions but, in spite of this, in the last two years, Repubblika was never invited once on any programme airing on TVM. Additionally, when being reported about on the news bulletin, the item dealing with the NGO’s event is pushed towards the end.

He said that this is a decision not taken by the journalists, but by people “higher up”.

The Repubblika President said that this behaviour needs to stop and that the PBS should give an impartial and “full story” service to the general public.

The National Broadcasting Policy obliges PBS to act impartially on subjects of a political controversy, giving different views and allowing all parties to express themselves. Facts ought to be respected and treated as sacred. The fact that in the last two years, Repubblika was never invited to take part in PBS programmes amounts to censorship, he said. The last time Aquilina said he was invited on PNBS was almost three years ago.

He then gave a list of activities that Repubblika organised in the past years, with PBS refraining from inviting anyone from Repubblika to speak about them.

“They invited someone who wrote a book praising Adolf Hitler, but they did not invite us,” Aquilina said.

This systematic censorship was not done by the journalists, but by Castille, he added, saying that the NGO is demanding more space on the national channel.