The Green Party has requested an immediate meeting with the Broadcasting Authority to discuss the manner in which PBS will be allotting airtime amongst political parties in its current affairs programmes during the electoral campaign. This was stated by Ralph Cassar, AD‘s General Secretary.

He added that the Broadcasting Authority has already issued a directive on current affairs programmes on other TV stations and AD expects that this directive, which grants access to AD to all TV stations including the political stations, is applied.

Carmel Cacopardo AD Deputy Chairman said that primarily AD wanted to ensure that its views are adequately represented on Xarabank, Bondi+, Dissett and TVAM and other programmes.

Cacopardo added that as things stand today, AD was allotted eight minutes in comparison to the 50 minutes each allotted to the PN and PL respresentatives during discussion programmes between party leaders and deputy leaders on the programme Xarabank. He stated that this is both unreasonable and unacceptable.

On the TV programme Dissett, AD was granted limited access consisting of short pre-recorded comments whilst on the TV programme Bondi+ AD representatives were rarely invited to participate.

Cacopardo concluded by stating that “AD expects that PBS grants airtime access to Alternattiva Demokratika.” It also expects that the Broadcasting Authority through PBS restores the imbalance created by the political TV stations.