TVM’s silence while Floriana empties

TVM’s Boycott of Floriana’s Demographic Crisis

Published on The Times of Malta on Tuesday, 24 February 2026

Floriana is facing a demographic crisis that is no longer gradual, abstract, or debatable. It is visible and measurable. Families are disappearing, young residents are not replacing older generations, and residential homes continue to give way to solely commercial activity. A locality that once sustained a living community is steadily being hollowed out, functioning by day and emptying by night.

For months, the Floriana Local Council has treated this as an emergency. We did not issue one statement and moved on. We held three press conferences and issued a periodic stream of press releases, consistently raising the alarm regarding population decline, loss of residential balance, and the long-term social consequences of turning a historic community into just only a commercial zone.

Beyond public statements, a structured policy document that I put forward on Floriana’s demographic crisis was unanimously approved by the Local Council. That document set out concrete proposals aimed at safeguarding residential life, addressing population decline, and restoring demographic sustainability. Following its approval, the issue was taken beyond the locality. Several meetings were held with the Social Committee of the MCESD, with government representatives, with the Opposition, and with other local councils. The crisis was treated as what it is: not a parochial complaint, but a national social concern.

Yet Malta’s national broadcaster, TVM, has offered no meaningful or sustained coverage of this issue.

This absence is becoming difficult to interpret as coincidence. It increasingly feels like avoidance.

A particular instance was during TVM’s attendance at the council’s press conference held on 2^nd of May 2025, TVM attended this conference with the impression that it concerned the Fireworks Festival. Once it became clear that the press conference was instead focused on Floriana’s demographic crisis and residential displacement, no coverage followed. Not on television, not online, and not through the broadcaster’s several news platforms.

The cameras were present. The issue was real. The story existed. But the reporting of did not ensue.

This experience raises a legitimate question: what determines whether an issue becomes a news point for our national broadcaster?

The only time Floriana’s demographic concerns received notable exposure on TVM was when the Leader of the Opposition visited the locality. That is understandable in a sense. PBS has institutional obligations to cover the Leader of the Opposition and the Opposition. But a community’s demographic collapse should not depend on political protocol to gain visibility. A crisis affecting residents, families, and the long-term sustainability of a locality should stand on its own merit.

When repeated interventions by an elected local council fail to generate coverage, it is fair to ask whether certain subjects are being filtered out at an editorial level. TVM is a public service broadcaster, funded by the public and intended to reflect national realities fairly, including those that are uncomfortable or inconvenient.

This is not a criticism of journalists and technical crews. I have worked in the field myself and know how demanding the profession is. Reporters, camera operators, and newsroom staff work under pressure and do their best within tight constraints. The issue here is not the individual journalist. It is the broader editorial direction that determines which stories are pursued and which quietly fall away.

And this story should be pursued.

Floriana’s demographic decline deserves investigation, not silence. It deserves journalists who speak to residents, examine planning patterns, analyse property conversion trends, and question whether national policy is protecting communities or slowly erasing them.

Because the cost of ignoring this predicament is permanent. When a locality loses families, it loses its long-term social fabric. Schools weaken, neighbourhood networks fade, voluntary organisations struggle, and traditions survive only as performance rather than lived reality. Floriana risks becoming a backdrop rather than remaining a community.

This pattern of silence raises questions that deserve answers. What is the editorial reasoning behind the consistent absence of coverage on Floriana’s demographic crisis? How does a locality’s social decline fail to meet the threshold of national relevance? And in a public national service broadcaster, how independent are editorial decisions when issues touch on planning policy, development pressures, and government responsibility?

These are not attacks. They are legitimate questions about transparency, accountability, and the role of public broadcasting in a democracy.

Floriana is not asking for favour. It is asking to be seen, to be understood, and to receive the attention and action needed to safeguard a community facing an existential crisis.