Most of this is sadly untranslatable. Not that sadly I suppose.

One TV has a story about Leo Brincat, a former Labour Minister who sits on the EU’s Court of Auditors. The headline says Leo Brincat is doing “important” work in the EU, referring to two files of fairly routine audits on Leo Brincat’s desk.

The files are described in a way that is designed not to be understood. Look at the second file they quote: “Inkarigu ieħor huwa dwar il-koperazzjoni transfruntiera biex jiġi vvalutat jekk il-programmi ta’ koperazzjoni bejn il-fruntieri tal-Istrument Ewropew tal-Viċinat kinux effettivi biex isaħħu l-koperazzjoni territorjali tal-fruntieri esterni kollha tal-Unjoni Ewropea.” Huh?

It doesn’t matter that the average One TV viewer has no idea what any of that mumbo jumbo means. Scratch that. It is important that the average One TV viewer has no idea what any of that mumbo jumbo means.

The whole point of the “story” is to give the audience a sweetener after, to their utter amazement, they saw Robert Abela fly all the way to Strasbourg to congratulate Roberta Metsola on her election yesterday.

Tagħna wkoll bravu ta, they say like competitive and rather embarrassing parents.

No doubt Leo Brincat is doing good work. He owes his job to Joseph Muscat who nominated him for it. To my admittedly limited knowledge, he’s harming no one where he is so I wouldn’t have bothered bringing him up.

One TV wheeled him out like the picture book handed out on the prize day to make sure nobody’s heart is broken watching the smarter students win all the awards.

The thing about Roberta Metsola’s election that One TV will never explain to its audience is that she owes her success to no one but herself. Imagine that.