A very polarized and ideologically-controlled media landscape

Malta has a very rich media landscape, considering its small size. This has developed largely since freedom of the press was established at law in Malta during British rule in 1839. Ever since, print media of all forms has flourished, to the extent that even during the Italian Risorgimento, for example in 1848, Italian exiles living in Malta would set up periodicals of all sorts in order to communicate their message in Italy as well as in Malta. The number of printing presses on the Island multiplied rapidly and some were quickly associated with the political parties that started taking shape between the 1880s and 1930. During that period and until independence in 1964, the story of the press is very closely related to the dynamics of power politics in a fortress colony with the power players consisting of the Catholic Church, the Colonial Government represented by the Governor and the political parties. From the very beginning, reaching one’s readers depended on financial means and this in turn meant that the daily, weekly or monthly print periodicals quickly turned to a business model which required advertising although the price of the periodical was most often a ha’penny or counted in pence. The allegiances of the print media to the multiple parties existing on the island could quite often be discerned. It is one of the ironies of history that one of Malta’s largest and most influential independent media houses in 2023 was also established by the Leader of the now-defunct Constitutional Party. Its independence developed organically although Labour Party supporters would recently always claim an anti-Labour bias in the Times of Malta newspapers published by Allied Newspapers Ltd., apparently forgetting that a century ago the Malta Labour Party was actually allied with the Constitutional Party.

Print media depended on literacy amongst the population though it was common for groups of people to request the more literate amongst them to read items of interest from newspapers, other periodicals and pamphlets. The large number of printing presses made pamphleteering a useful outlet for politically-inclined individuals who thus could avoid the costs and effort required to run a regularly published periodical. The growth of the print media was thus organic and in direct proportion to the growing literacy rate in Malta with the introduction of government financed public schools first at primary and then at secondary level after the educational reforms of the 1880s. The Colonial Government recognised the need to also reach the less literate parts of the population which were not being reached by the periodicals being printed in Malta in the English, Maltese and Italian languages. It therefore facilitated the creation in 1935 of a cable radio service operated by the British Rediffusion Company. Broadcasting locally-produced content in both Maltese and English, as well as relaying BBC programmes, Rediffusion penetrated most homes in urban Malta. Its British ownership and closeness to the Colonial Government marked it out as being Anglophile and some of its facilities were targeted by political rioting in 1958, events that would then impact the regulation of media in Malta. The importance of rediffusion and broadcasting, highlighted by the arrival of local television in Malta in 1962 was recognised to the extent that special clauses on Broadcasting and a Broadcasting Authority were provided for by Malta’s Independence Constitution of 1964. This was supposed to ensure that whoever owned a television or radio station, there would be fair access to all parties to these media.

Following independence, the countries political scene became increasingly polarised with the decline of smaller parties as well as a gradual but steady decrease in the influence of the Catholic Church. This led to the decline in readership of print media owned by the Catholic Church and the disappearance of the Church-owned daily newspaper Il-Hajja. By 1987, with both of the two main parties (PN and MLP) running their own daily and Sunday Newspapers in Maltese, with occasional forays into the English-speaking press too, the main battles were over who would control the state-owned TV and radio stations. This situation changed drastically with the liberalisation of the media in 1990 when a plethora of new radio and TV stations came onto the scene. Most of these were privately owned but PN and MLP also took the opportunity to launch their own radio and TV stations.

This cultural and political polarization still plays a key role in understanding Malta’s current media landscape. For example, depending on the type of media outlet, the language employed may vary significantly. In the case of printed media, out of 15 registered media outlets, 7 are in Maltese and 8 in English, indicating an almost even division. However, all 6 registered television stations use mainly or solely Maltese, which is the same situation as in the case of radio stations. The electronic media landscape is much more diverse, with 2 outlets employing both languages and a slightly higher number of English outlets by comparison to the Maltese ones. The move towards English in the electronic media landscape seems to be linked both to an increase in the number of English-language media consumers, as a result of the recent migration waves, but also due to a general preference towards English by the younger generation.

When it comes to the structure of the media ownership and control in the country, there are several distinctive elements, embedded in Malta’s socio-political evolution. Firstly, a significant number of outlets are politically and/or ideologically controlled. Seven out of the 15 registered printed media outlets either belong directly to political parties or affiliated professional associations, such as labour unions (In Nazzjon, L-Orizzont, Kullħadd, Il-Mument, It-Torċa and Illum) or to the Catholic Church (Il-Leħen). In the case of broadcast media, each party has its own channel (television and radio), namely the Labour Party controls One Radio and One TV, while the Nationalist Party has Net Radio and Net TV. The Catholic Church does not own a tv station, but it does own a radio station (103 Malta’s Heart) and an electronic media outlet (Newsbook). All party-controlled media employ Maltese as a primary language of communication, thus showing that politicians are aware of the efficacy of Maltese in reaching out to the largest possible number of people, while the electronic media outlet of the Catholic Church employs both English and Maltese. The market share of these outlets is quite considerable, albeit it varies in accordance with the support levels garnered among the general Maltese population by the entities (political parties and Church) using them as a platform.

Secondly, most media outlets have a director, a manager and/or board members have Maltese citizenship, while most companies (including secondary and tertiary owners) are registered in Malta. Thirdly, a large segment of the independent media is privately-owned, and provides mainly content in  content. Among these, the largest media outlets (combining print with online platforms), which are also one of the largest overall in terms of market share are legacy-outlets, such as Times of Malta and The Malta Independent. The public broadcaster (TVM) still plays an important role in the Maltese media landscape (through its television and radio channels and online platform), however its independence has been questioned. The intrinsic design of its governance structure makes it vulnerable to ideological interventions in its editorial policies from the part of the ruling party.

One of the key changes to the media landscape in Malta has undoubtedly been the advent of publishing via the internet which freed journalists and opinion writers from the need to be associated with traditional print media. This has led to a number of individual bloggers as well as fledgling private news organisations which have achieved a significant following amongst the Maltese English-speaking public. Of note in the growth of these new forms of digital media were the internationally known – and since assassinated – Daphne Caruana Galizia (Running Commentary), as well as the blogs of Manuel Delia (Truth be told) and Shift News. The financial advantages of not having to be burdened by the costs of a printing press, print runs and distribution has meant that independent-minded journalists and opinion writers could create or join new outlets which could be accessed free-of-charge by the reading public and published (almost) free-of-charge by the journalist or writer concerned. While this has led to electronic postings, often on a daily basis, reaching thousands or tens of thousands of readers, it is a development which is not necessarily always caught in formal reporting structures since, often quite deliberately, the journalists concerned would not register themselves formally with the authorities, as a way of insisting on their right to freedom of expression and ability to practise their profession without requiring a license or permit from the government to do so. This means that while everybody on the island would know who owns the website or blog, and the people behind it, the precise fiscal ownership structures are not transparent or easy to find. For example,  Shift News declares it is a community-funded online news portal, which publishes its financial information directly on its website in an attempt to increase transparency.

Transparency levels in terms of ownership by comparison to funding are markedly different in Malta. While official information may not always available on media ownership, due to the fact there are no specific legal obligations whereby media companies are required to publish their ownership structures on their website or in documents that are easily accessible to the public, the public is well aware of who owns, which media outlet in Malta. However, all companies in Malta are under the obligation to register with the Registrar of Companies (RoC) by submitting a memorandum of association which must, inter alia, include the name and residence of each of the shareholders. RoC is available online but the details that are accessible to the public for free are very limited and they can only be obtained after paying a fee (5 euros/report). The Broadcasting Authority is entitled to require and obtain any type of information it considers necessary from the license holders. However, the Authority does not publish this information on its website.

The situation is different when it comes to revenue sources. While the business registry should, in theory, include information on annual revenue of companies, not all legal entities registered abide by this rule. The outlets providing the least information are party-owned media outlets, whose annual revenues have not been declared now for several years, allegedly because of the levels of debt they incur. The absence of a unique template for reporting means that even in the case of the other companies, the completeness of the information provided is not always the same. Transparency levels are, however, at their lowest when it comes to government funding of media outlets, irrespective of whether they take the form of public subsidies or advertising revenue. There is no information on either the amount of public subsidies received by different media outlets (with the notable exception of the COVID-19 stimulus which was granted to most private entities) nor on money paid for advertising. The main, if not only, source of information in the case of the latter are parliamentary questions raised by the Opposition. However, when answering the government only provides full amount spent by a particular Ministry for media services for the interval concerned, without mentioning either what type of media (tv, radio, print) nor which media outlet.