Theatrics in the House

It is no exaggeration to say that life as it unfolds inside the House of Representatives often resembles that on the stage. Both sets of actors take themselves very seriously, but both also know they do not always manage to convince their audiences.

This may give one the wrong impression that parliamentary reporters, poor souls, are constantly being entertained, when it is often boredom, mixed with unexciting routines, that reigns supreme in what is the country’s highest institution. But when it is time for some theatrics, fun can after all be had, especially with today’s digital tools at the newsmen’s prompt disposal.

It’s worth recalling the story why, when I first ventured into parliamentary reporting, I had to first ask passers-by in Valletta the way to the House. I had found it difficult and embarrassing to tell my erstwhile News Editor I did not know where our people’s jovial representatives actually met, which in those days was in the Tapestries Chamber of the Grand Master’s palace.

Having mustered that indignity, I then needed a colleague’s guidance as to what was going on, who was doing what and what I should ignore or scribble on my jotter. Good old Godfrey Grima was my saviour on that first day as he had quickly perceived my predicament. In between making sure I did not miss some piece of political wisdom and getting me used to the jargon, he told me to wait for a call when I was back in our newsroom. He did call and I gratefully wrote what he dictated to me over the phone... thank goodness an honest summary of what had taken place in Parliament that evening. He could have told me the session had ended with a strip-tease presentation and I am sure I would have tendered it for publication, so naïve, straight-out-ofsixth-form was I at the time.

As time passed, it was easier to kill the boredom and enjoy the sporadic theatrics. Some of the Honourables from both sides of the House were more amusing than others, but there were also the special days when the acting got to be a bit more slapstick. On one occasion, a car battery belt was the main attraction as it got carried across the floor a few times and displayed like some golden chalice or sacred relic-holder!

All this, of course, came flooding back when I watched the Opposition leader theatrically tearing apart the pages of a government contract that had just been submitted for transparency’s sake. Of course, he could not tear the pages of some much more controversial contracts signed by the previous administration, as they have remained unpublished and will never be published; as had made sure it was legally forbidden, certainly not for transparency’s sake.

This “striscia la notizia” piece of parliamentary bravado was, during a previous session, preceded by a display of placards with neatly-printed slogans. Not exactly the dignified scenario Reno Piano, the renowned Italian architect who designed the new parliament building while denying Valletta its fortified-city gate, had in mind. But it must have been fun for today’s parliamentary reporters with their electronic gadgets and easy access to a parliament at the very entrance to our capital city. All they needed to make the fanfare complete was a staccato rendition of the Innu Malti.

Missing all this electronic sophistication is one of the frustrating aspects of growing old in the media. We had to literally run back to our newsroom (in the so-called parliamentary Pressroom at the palace where there was only one telephone line available to whoever got to it first) to write our reports before deadline, but the fun and the theatrics seem to have remained pretty much the same... ***

Twitter trigger oops

With the fresh incumbent at the White House determined to keep the rest of the world informed via his social media tweets, it is no surprise that so much confusion and concern have followed his inauguration.

The trouble is these days, with the infuriating ignorance that floods social media and somehow makes those opinions more important than a few blokes arguing at the bar (which to my mind is very much the same thing), the spotlight rarely dims.

When one bewails this trigger-happy Twitter generation, it does not mean one should begrudge the citizen his newlyfound freedom to declare his opinion to all and sundry. The immediacy provided by the social media network, as opposed to the congestion of persistent letter-writers who used to haunt newspaper subbers in the not so distant past, is in itself a declared right and, however much we complain or disagree, there is no going back from it, ever.

The temptation is often to unplug oneself out of the whole global circus – at a hefty price, of course. The need for opinion flows and the dissemination of news and events is a still-growing phenomenon that has overwhelmed even the biggest news-gathering institutions in the world. Attempts to have extremist, vulgar, racist and slanderous comments removed before they actually appear have proved unsuccessful, with the whole situation getting more complicated by big-government tactics to either control the whole thing or else use it for the Orwellian manoeuvres Edward Snowden dutifully keeps telling us about.

I am of course talking of highly suspicious actions taken against Facebook, Twitter and other social media machines in places like the United States, Russia, Turkey, Britain and elsewhere, and NOT on the mere registration of news website editors as has been the case, for decades on decades, with traditional newspaper, radio and TV editors all over the democratic world. Readers, subscribers, fellow bloggers etc., need to know who the editor of a news website is for them to feel legally reassured they can refer to the halls of justice should they ever need to.

It is good to know that the Institute of Maltese Journalists (IĠM) has taken the initiative to take on the authorities over the issue and that all the recent hullaballoo seems to have been just another typical Maltese upsurge of very hot political air. ***

What’s ha-ha in French?

One curious, tail end question: what if the precious La Valette dagger stolen from Malta by the French in 1798 were to be stolen while on exhibition for the first time on the Island since then? Just thinking. Could we just say ha-ha, we’re keeping it?