Sin Chew focuses on MCA and DAP

Sin Chew Jit Poh has given balanced coverage of election news for both ruling and opposition parties in the period monitored (15-21 Feb). Some parties received more coverage on certain days; other had more on the other days. For example, the newspaper carried at least six news items on opposition parties but only four pieces on the ruling parties on 19 Feb. On the other hand, there were more than eight pieces about ruling parties and less than three on opposition parties on 21 February.

It is the tradition of the editorial column of Sin Chew Jit Poh not to take a stand on sensitive political issues; so not surprisingly, the editorial column didn’t carry any comment on the coming election. A few few columns analysed the election strategies adopted by the various political parties.

Among the parties, the MCA and the DAP received more attention than any of the other parties. These reports often appeared on the upper sections of the pages. The coverage of the MCA contained more diverse views as there were many spokespersons from the MCA. The DAP spokespersons, on the other hand, were mainly Lim Kit Siang and Kerk Kim Hock.

There was more coverage of UMNO and PAS than of Gerakan and Keadilan. The UMNO spokesmen were always the ministers or people who held official positions. Hadi Awang, on the other hand, was the most popular spokesman from PAS.