Michael Jackson fans demand investigation on Martin Bashir’s “Living with Michael Jackson”

Martin Bashir is currently in the spotlight regarding his 1995 Panorama interview with Princess Diana. An inquiry led by the former Supreme Court judge Lord Dyson has suggested Bashir to be “unreliable”, “devious” and “dishonest” and concluded that Bashir and his team deceived Princess Diana into participating and even forged bank statements to secure the interview.

Lord Dyson states: “What Mr Bashir did was not an impulsive act done in the spur of the moment. It was carefully planned… What he did was devious and dishonest.” The report shows that Bashir repeatedly lied, but also acknowledges a serious breach of journalistic ethics and BBC rules.

Prince William and Prince Harry have both made statements regarding the ruling and suggested that Bashir’s interview was the catalyst for Princess Diana’s paranoia in the last few years of her life and set a course that led to her death on August 31, 1997.

Following Dyson’s investigation, Martin Bashir steps down from his role as the BBC’s Religion Editor due to “ill health”.

In the aftermath, many journalists and broadcasters are scrambling to condemn Bashir’s actions and disassociate themselves with the concept of ‘bad journalism’ – a move of irony as Bashir was hailed by his journalistic peers and even awarded for his 1995 Panorama special and secured lucrative job opportunities off the back of its success.

Once such opportunity was the chance to interview Michael Jackson, who hadn’t offered an all-access interview since his special with Oprah Winfrey in 1993 (Winfrey would later go on to betray Michael on numerous occasions.) for any journalist the chance to document the most talked-about artist of our time was the scoop of the decade!

For 8 months from May 2002 to January 2003, Bashir followed the King of Pop promising to create an honest documentary on Michael Jackson’s life with the star’s participation.

The finished programme aired on ITV in the UK on February 3, 2003 and on ABC in the US on February 6, 2003 and appeared as hatchet job of mismatched moments that used tabloid sensationalism as their stimulus.

Following the airing, Michael Jackson complained to television watchdogs about the programme which he claims “utterly betrayed” him. [FULL STATEMENT HERE]

To rebut the programme, Michael released a second interview title “Take Two: The Footage You Were Never Meant to See” which aired on FOX in the US and Sky One in the UK. The footage was filmed by Hamid Moslehi for Michael’s own documentation of events, yet some of the footage including that of the Arvizo Family extensively praising Michael was not handed over for the original programme and only came to light when Moslehi’s apartment was raided as part of the 2003 investigation. Moslehi later sued Michael regarding the use of and compensation for the footage – Read the full article here

The Bashir programme led to a series of events that caused Michael’s arrest on November 20, 2003 and a trial ensued, beginning on February 28, 2005. Michael was fully acquitted on June 13 of the same year.

During the trial, Michael Jackson’s attorney, Tom Mesereau showed the court documentation that suggested Bashir had fabricated documents to persuade the singer to be interviewed. Through his legal representation, Bashir refused to answer questions posed by Mesereau.

Celebrities and friends of Michael also spoke out, including Madonna – who was so right –

“I haven’t seen that documentary but it sounds disgusting, like Bashir exploited a friendship. Publicly humiliating someone for your own gain will only come back to haunt you. I can assure you, all there people will be sorry. God’s going to have his revenge”

Madonna

Ultimately, the trauma of the accusations, the trial and the view of the general public after the Bashir programme had a lasting impact on Michael’s life and career and started a chain of events that led to certain associations, agreements and complications which it can be argued, caused his untimely death in June 2009.

For decades, Michael Jackson fans have highlighted Bashir’s unethical conduct and dishonesty and this written off as ‘fan hoopla’. Now the general public have been given the opportunity to hear about the type of ‘journalist’ Bashir was from other sources as a result of the Dyson inquiry. It is now time for the world to know about the full story behind Bashir’s “Living with Michael Jackson” and so we are asking ITV to launch a full inquiry into the programme, how Bashir ensured Michael’s participation and whether they inadvertently or consciously acted in a manner which can be seen as a directly violation of journalistic conduct.

A petition has been created by the team at MJVibe to ask Sir Peter Bazalgette, ITV Chairman, Chair of the Nominations Committee, to take action and investigate Bashir, Granada and ITV associates for their roles in “Living with Michael Jackson”:

Please sign and share the petition which will be delivered to Sir Peter Bazalgette at ITV.

NOTE: All donations made on this petition has nothing to do with MJVibe. This is standard practice from Chance.org to monetarise on petitions. MJVibe is not receiving any payments for having created the petition.