A classic case of "government-say-so journalism"

Saiful Azhar Abdullah’s editorial in the New Straits Times on 1 June talked about the Thai media not getting the message of the Malaysian government that Malaysia is not an asylum for Thai exiles. It is a good example of Malaysia’s government-say-so journalism and the problems with it.

He began with the Thai media focusing on a Wan Abdul Kadir Che Man a day or two before the 44th General Border Committee Meeting in Bangkok on May 28 between Thailand and Malaysia (headed by Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak). According to the Thai media, Wan Kadir was leader of the Thai separatist movement (Bersatu) in southern Thailand and a former Thai citizen living in exile in Malaysia for the past 14 years.

Saiful was already annoyed with the Thai media’s subtle and outright suggestion that Malaysia was providing asylum to Wan Kadir. He seemed to be asking: did the Thais not understand the Malaysian government’s denial that Malaysia was an asylum for Thai rebels since last April - a denial that was given to Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra?

Saiful’s editorial next went on to say that the Malaysian contingent to the 44th GBC meeting did not want to focus on the situation in southern Thailand. Malaysian officials even told Malaysian journalists not to raise questions on the matter with the Thai contingent in order to avoid creating any impression that Malaysia was interfering with Thailand’s domestic affairs. As far as Deputy Prime Minister Najib was concerned, the aim, wrote Saiful, was “to erase suspicions, if any, of Malaysia being a haven for rebel leaders”.

Now, apparently Malaysian journalists and Saiful went along with the Malaysian request. How very odd that they did not find anything wrong with being barred from raising questions on troubled southern Thailand, which could have a potentially serious impact on the Thai-Malaysian border. And on the very occasion of the meeting about the border issue!

Malaysian journalists appeared more interested in allowing the Malaysian government to set the agenda for them. Indeed, they even went along with the Malaysian authorities’ implication that they themselves could not be trusted to ask any questions about southern Thailand. Saiful appeared happy with how he and his fellow Malaysian journalists basically had Deputy Prime Minister Najib and his contingent do the news gathering for them.

So much so that Saiful bristled at the Thai media for their nerve in taking a different approach to covering the 44th GBC meeting. In his words:

“...Unlike previous GBC meetings, Najib and his counterpart General Chetta Thanajaro decided to leave it to their Chiefs of Staff to hold the Press conference, issuing a one-page joint statement on the outcome of the meeting.

Pressmen crowded the conference hall and when it began without Najib and Chetta, reporters and photographers abandoned the room. The red-faced Chiefs of Staff decided to end the Press conference.

It was not Chetta but Najib the Thai journalists were after...Najib was mobbed by journalists throwing a barrage of questions at him on Malaysia’s position on Wan Kadir.

They got the same answer–Malaysia’s stand had not changed.”

Saiful did not find anything odd with the leaders of the two countries at the meeting being missing from their own Press conference. This despite the fact that such a no-show was unheard of in previous GBC meetings.

Why should any independent journalists worthy of their professional integrity be happy with getting the Chiefs of Staff as replacements at the Press conference? Indeed, as news hounds, they should smell right away that something was not quite right with Najib and Chetta’s unprecedented disappearing act. But not Saiful, who was content with having the authorities tell him what questions to ask or not to ask and just accept whatever was given to him, including whoever showed up at the Press conference.

Saiful was particularly displeased with the Thai journalists who abandoned the Press conference to go after only Najib with questions. His point about Najib giving the same answer that Malaysia did not provide asylum to Thai rebels was made to chide the Thai journalists that they should know better.

But why should they? Why should they or any independent journalists worthy of their professional integrity just accept whatever the government dishes out to them, however many times the information might be repeated?

More importantly, the Thai journalists acted not as though they did not have any reasons. On the contrary, they had a very good question to ask: how did the position of the Malaysian government on not giving asylum to Thai rebels square with the fact that separatist leader Wan Kadir has been living in Malaysia as a citizen for the past 14 years? Is that not a legitimate question to pursue?

Indeed, it was because of the questions from the Thai journalists that Najib promised he would look into Wan Kadir’s case. And, lo and behold, the next day, 29 May 2004, the International Islamic University came forward to confirm what the Thai media had known all along regarding Wan Kadir. It also added that Wan Kadir was appointed associate professor in the school’s political science department in 2001. Apparently, he had long been cleared by the Malaysian authorities to work in Malaysia.

Now, if the Thai journalists had taken the government-say-so approach to journalism, it is highly doubtful the world would get to know the truth about Wan Kadir.

Saiful ended his editorial by saying that “Malaysia just wants to be a good neighbour.” But how? By the Malaysian authorities telling Malaysian reporters not to ask Thailand about southern Thailand purportedly for not wanting to create any impression of Malaysian interference in the sovereignty of Thailand? By the Malaysian government agreeing to Thailand’s request to send Malaysian Islamic preachers to teach in southern Thailand? By journalists just having to accept what Najib or the Malaysian government had stated all along - that Malaysia was no asylum for Thai rebels?

All that has been shown by the Wan Kadir case to be an inadequate way to be a good neighbour. But with the expose on Wan Kadir now out in the open, it will help remove some of the suspicions the Thais and their government might have had towards the word of the Malaysian government. This can only help to get us to be truly considered by them as a good neighbour.

This more positive turn of events is not due to the Malaysia’s government-say-so journalism but to the Thais, who (on this occasion) performed true to their craft as independent, professional journalists.

While we do not expect Saiful to thank the Thai journalists, we found him (and, by extension, his paper, the New Straits Times) to be misguided in impugning them as lacking interest in the good neighbourly relationship between our two countries.