Bloggers under attack again

Weblogs themselves were the focus of much online content recently. Overlapping themes contributing to this trend were an emphasis on the younger generation of voters and the efforts of party candidates to extend their campaign objectives via the Internet. Malaysia Today offered two entries of interest on 20 February: “More politicians taking their campaigns online” and “Bashing govt in blogs not Malaysian culture – Rais”.

The first entry opened by highlighting the “I work very hard” digital flyer spoof of Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi, which is said to have originated from Parti Keadilan Rakyat member Nathaniel Tan’s blog, jelas.info. The report referred to the image as a picture of the prime minister “with his eyes closed at a political event”. Malaysia Today readers jumped all over this description in the ‘comments’ section as the prime minister is clearly asleep in the photograph. The report noted that party members—particularly from the DAP and PKR—are using blogs to inform voters of party news “while occasionally taking swipes at the ruling party”. In addition, Malaysian “Netizens” are endorsing candidates on their personal blogs as well as starting online groups of “like-minded people”.

The last phrase hinted at Dan Sunstein’s well-known ‘echo chamber’ critique of weblogs, the argument being that blogs suffer from ‘preaching to the choir’ syndrome. The entry posed the question: “does online activity filter to the ground…does it translate into votes?” On the sceptical side, the article pointed out that Malaysia’s digital divide confines the reach of an online campaign to the middle class. In addition, many readers are unregistered or unmotivated to vote. Blogger and DAP candidate Jeff Ooi was quoted as saying, “'I'm doubtful it will make too much of a difference….we are still trying to get people online to walk the talk”. The article lent the next 187 words to online hopefuls, such as PKR’s Nathaniel Tan, who claimed the Internet “is the only avenue left for truth” and noted its “viral effect”. Finally, the report acknowledged Malaysia Today’s Raja Petra as one of the Internet’s biggest supporters due to an increasing number of people with Internet access.

Also posted on Malaysia Today was a Bernama article attacking bloggers for “bashing” Barisan Nasional leaders on their sites. Outgoing Culture, Arts and Heritage Minister Rais Yatim stated that the bloggers’ “government bashing” was a challenge facing the party, although “it was not the nature of BN leaders to resort to using blogsites to attack others in their campaigns to win the elections”. Rais Yatim called this an “unhealthy culture” and urged bloggers that “condemn” the government to “look at your own heart to see if it was clean” and even suggested that they “attend courses on good manners as good manners is Malaysian culture”. Rais Yatim also alluded to Pas spiritual leader Nik Aziz for his recent—and completely unrelated—‘orang utan’ comment, clearly tying the opposition (many of whom keep political blogs) to the issue. No statements were collected from bloggers for the report.

The entry drew 67 readers' comments as of 20 February. Notable entries pointed out the government’s use of the mainstream media to attack opposition leaders; many provided links to Youtube videos of lewd ‘BN nature’, while others insisted that most claims made against the government were true. Furthermore, Rais Yatim and the Bernama coverage did not specify what was included under the term “bashing”. The report lumped all bloggers under one broad generalisation and did not acknowledge those that exercise their democratic rights by engaging in constructive criticism of government actions and policies. Clearly, the weblogs are believed to have a large enough effect on Malaysian voters to incite this kind of reaction from the minister.

Vel Paari under fire

While the mainstream publications may be downplaying the controversial events surrounding MIC President S. Samy Vellu and his party, Malaysiakini has been following them closely. In “Indian M’sians vent fury on MIC leaders”, Malaysiakini reported on two recent events that “erupted into outbursts” when the crowd—“claiming to represent the community”—surrounded and heckled MIC leaders and demanded explanations for “why they have been left behind in terms of development”. According to the report, Samy Vellu’s son S Vel Paari, was targeted at a party event in Pajam from which his minders “whisked him away to safety”. The report noted that some of the minders were hurt in the ruckus but did not divulge details.

The report featured an eyewitness account: “the crowd listened and when he ended his speech, someone stood up and asked him to explain what had happened to the money collected by Maika”. The inclusion of this statement illustrated that members of the crowd were concerned about issues affecting the community and were not there merely to assault the leaders for their own gain. Yet, MIC leaders claimed just this. Malaysiakini offered MIC room to explain by releasing statements from Information Chief M Saravanan similar to those offered by Samy Vellu in the mainstream publications. In defence, M Saravanan insisted that the heckling groups displaying “thug-like behaviour” do not represent the sentiments of the Indian Malaysian community at large. The Federal Territory MIC chief suggested that “these are men who have been paid to embarrass the MIC leadership”. Malaysiakini did not attempt to discredit the MIC defence; instead it closed the article with two brief paragraphs contextualising the events leading up to the Hindraf rally on 25 November 2007.

Phantom voters

Malaysiakini once again brought questionable voter registration to the attention of readers with their entry, “‘Phantoms’ rock electoral polls in Penang”. The story—untouched by any of theSun, New Straits Times, or Star—exposed 500 voters registered to the abandoned address of the Army Div 2 Base in Georgetown, Penang, a “collection of derelict buildings and overgrown vegetation”. Malaysiakini pointed out that the discovery—made by the watchdog organisation Malaysians for Free and Fair Elections (Mafrel)—comes after “several assurances by the [Elections Commission] that its documentation is in order”. Northern region coordinator B K Ong states that “Mafrel has received numerous complaints that Penang…has a large number of ‘phantom’ voters in several opposition-held areas”.

Malaysiakini included an earlier explanation from the Election Commission in which it claimed that “cases of voters providing the same addresses are because when they don't have a home address and a common address was used for convenience” [sic]. However, a more recent statement from the Commission was not obtained.