Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak made a very interesting observation when launching 1Malaysia TV yesterday, the existence of an “information vacuum” in Malaysia in the information age with youths turning to alternative online site for news.
But is 1Malaysia TV the solution or it will part of the cause of the “information vacuum” plaguing the government’s credibility?
1Malaysia TV as Internet television is offering inter alia RTM1, RTM2 and TV3, the official channels which evoke intense distrust and low credibility of their information.
Without any change of policy to allow RTM1, RTM 2 and TV3 to be independent, non-partisan and professional tv stations, the primary cause of the “information vacuum” and also why not only youths but Malaysians as a whole are turning to alternative online sites for news and information would not be addressed.
Najib said information on alternative online sites as “sometimes fabricated or untrue”, but these criticisms are equally valid about the official media and now 1Malaysia TV – which is going to repackage the official media on Internet!
Although Najib said that it was essential to provide information to the rakyat rather than to black it out, “as it would only prompt them to seek it from alternative sources”, his administration had been guilty of the “black out” mindset and strategy when confronted with adverse or troublesome developments.
Najib’s own silence in December, which resound through the land, on the following five issues highlight this “black out” mentality and strategy, viz:
• The Cabinet position of Minister for Welfare, Family and Community Development, Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil in the face of the RM300 million National Feedlot Corporation (NFC) Cattle-Gate/Cow Condominium scandal;
• Malaysia’s worst Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2011 ranking and score – 60th place as compared to No. 23 in 1995 and lowest-ever score of 4.3 when Malaysia scored 5.32 in 1996, which means that Malaysia under Najib is perceived internationally as more corrupt than under two previous Prime Ministers, Tun Mahathir and Tun Abdullah.
• Call by 17 international and national environmental groups and activists including Greenpeace, Manser Bruno Fund and Fern, for the arrest and criminal prosecution of Sarawak Chief Minister, Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud and his 13 family members for massive graft and plundering of Sarawak’s rich natural resources;
• Penang High Court judgment against Utusan Malaysia, UMNO official newspaper, for mischievous defamation against Penang Chief Minister and Secretary-General Lim Guan Eng trying to depict Guan Eng as anti-Malay and anti-Islam, with award of RM200,000 for general and aggravated damages and RM25,000 for costs against Utusan; and
• The 2009 report of Washington-based financial watchdog Global Financial Integrity (GFI) that Malaysia continues to be one of the top five countries in the world suffering from the highest illicit capital outflow, registering a loss of over RM1 trillion (US$338 billion or RM1,077 billion) in past decade, 2000-2009, as a result of corrupt and misgovernance.
Will Najib demonstrate a change of this information “blackout” mindset and strategy and use 1Malaysia TV to break his silence and speak up to give an accounting and perspective as the nation’s Prime Minister on these five issues?
#1 by frothquaffer on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 3:57 pm
thanks for raising these points. i would like to know where the funding for 1Malaysia TV is coming from? Surely such a partisan political entity should not be paid out of the public purse but by the political animals behind the controls.
#2 by monsterball on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 4:00 pm
Somebody in UMNO b will be making millions with this so call..1Malaysia TV.
#3 by yhsiew on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 4:17 pm
1Malaysia TV will be another flopped project like the National Email project.
#4 by cintanegara on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 4:42 pm
When there’s nothing left to talk about…..the same things being repeated over and over again…. like an old record player……can only play the same song….if the listeners dislike the song or find it boring then….they can either turn it off or dump it into the ocean…
#5 by assamlaksa on Tuesday, 20 December 2011 - 2:26 am
…that’s why we turn off tv1, tv2, tv3, they are so boring
#6 by Loh on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 5:27 pm
///Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak made a very interesting observation when launching 1Malaysia TV yesterday, the existence of an “information vacuum” in Malaysia in the information age with youths turning to alternative online site for news.
But is 1Malaysia TV the solution or it will part of the cause of the “information vacuum” plaguing the government’s credibility?///–kIT
If youths turn to online sites for news, then there is no information vacuum at all. It is just that there are people who do not know how to access online sites, and that does not seem to be the government’s concern.
If Najib considers that there was information vacuum, then the government news agencies of multiple media must have been supplying propaganda instead of news. The government’s 1MalaysiaTV will be more of the same. Luckily, that cannot replace online sites for information.
The government actually does not care about what the people know about the corrupt practises currently being applied by minister, even by one of the Vice President of UMNO. Else Shahrizat should have been asked to leave her position as Minister though she is free to remain a VP of UMNO till cows go home to the Condo. We do not care how Shahrizat is being treated as an elected official of UMNO. It is UMNO’s right to have her remind people that UMNO VP is corrupted. But the people have a right to demand that public funds are not expended on paying a Minister who is not morally upright to serve the people. Unless Najib has changed the function of ministers serving the nation into serving UMNO.
#7 by monsterball on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 7:16 pm
Cintanegara does not like bad news repeated over and over again.
He hopes once is enough….and so easier for voters to forget.
What about corruptions repeated over and over again by rouges and thieves by UMNO b for decades?
That’s OK….cintanegara?
He must have got his bonus to talk nonsense again.
#8 by monsterball on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 7:21 pm
Every step Najib makes….PR is watching like a hawk…cintanegera.
Get used to it…..exposing and reminding voters…so much so…Najib’s flag was flown at half mast by U students.
Voters are leaving BN.
Don’t you know that?
What about you?
#9 by cemerlang on Monday, 19 December 2011 - 11:14 pm
All these 1 thingy. Sounds more like a privatisation scheme or something. Did you watch the video on how the North Koreans cry openly and publicly at the death of their beloved leader Kim Jong Il ? How they cried. Even the tv news presenter weeped. Such obvious fakeness. They must have been paid or given something for putting up a wayang kulit. Now the son is ” in power “. So you can imagine who are the ones pulling his moves. Did anyone cried when Bapa Malaysia went ? These days with the Y generation who only know how to e-talk, how would another tv channel rehabilitate them ? You mean to say that the existing ones do not provide enough infor or the correct infor ? Which means we have been listening to lies ? Infor travels at lightning speed these days. You have your iphones and that is the latest. If you are eating durian now, the other side of the world knows you are eating durian now. Why ? Because you or your friend sent that infor.
#10 by Loh on Tuesday, 20 December 2011 - 12:34 am
///(The Malay Mail) – Bumiputra companies must be the only choice for government projects irrespective of whether they can deliver.
This is the stand of the Malay Chamber of Commerce Malaysia (MCCM). Its president, Syed Ali Alatas, said projects such as the RM3 billion Pudu Prison redevelopment must be given to a bumiputra company regardless of whether there are better parties – local or foreign – which can see the project through with the best returns to taxpayers.
“The issue is not whether the contract should be given to a bumiputra or a non-bumiputra company,” he told The Malay Mail.///–MalaysiaToday
That has also been the stand taken by the UMNO-led government. Syed Ali Alatas is obviously in the wrong company to have to make that suggestion. The latest was the cowgate project.
How else have the trillion ringgit of oil funds gone without uplifting the standard of living for Malaysians? How else could the close to a trillion ringgit of black money leaving Malaysia?
The fact that Syed Ali Alatas dared to make that suggestion shows that racism in the country is getting worse by the year. It was the need to ensure that the weaker section of the society were looked after that the country was divided by race at independence. Then after a coup d’etat, in the name of helping the needy irrespective of race that NEP was launched. It went further than helping the poor when the people of the protected race have to be made rich so that the rich and powerful can become tycoons. Now 40 years after the excuse, there is now no need to hide racism. Sometimes ago the so-called tragedy of May 13 was even made the bargaining plea; it seemed that UMNO was happy to organize once again a repeat of the tragedy. Can one imagine that UMNO dared to declare that it would make May 13 happen? That proves that it was UMNO’s masterpiece 42 years ago.
#11 by Loh on Tuesday, 20 December 2011 - 12:41 am
UMNO members might show their outpouring grief when Najib lead UMNO to defeat in the GE 13.
The Dear Leader of North Korea is not as rich as the leaders in Malaysia. Here a couple of billion ringgit difference in the price of militarywares needs no review by a third person shows that PM Malaysia is more powerful than the President of US or China. The PM of Malaysia can decide how rich he wants to be, if he cares to be.
#12 by undertaker888 on Tuesday, 20 December 2011 - 7:49 am
Umno from top to bottom has no sense of itself. Rasuah is the only lubricant oiling this massive rotten machinery.
And every single thing they do, like this 1malaysial tv, is to cover up their tracks.
It will be a great day when the rakyat of all walks are able to shout, UMNO HAS FALLEN!!!BN HAS FALLEN!!!
#13 by Bigjoe on Tuesday, 20 December 2011 - 8:37 am
All it does is confirm that Najib’s administration is mostly about the show rather than the subtance of it. IF nobody is watching RTM, who will watch its IPTV? This is simply doing it for the sake of not being labeled as irrelevant. THIS was why Proton was started at the cost of hundreds of billions over the years to Malaysian and now have to be sold for dirt cheap to a crony no less at even more cost to us in the future. This was why Perwaja lost billions, PKFZ, NFC, bank bumi, etc. etc..Is it surprising they come up with 1Msia email, RM9b patrol boats after losing billions on it already?
It simply pathetic..Its like saying we owe it to UMNO to be stupid so they can rule..
#14 by waterfrontcoolie on Wednesday, 21 December 2011 - 6:45 am
We all know the REAL motive behind each proposed project; to collect cash as much as possible since the time of ‘negotiated tender process’. The person who introduced this form of tender had only one objective: to swindle the public! Of course by getting characters like the late Zakaria, now we have Ibrahim and so forth, they ensure that the THINKING Melayu would never survive even in UMNO. After a generation, there is no more any rational thinking Melayu even in UMNO. All of them have been honed with a single motive of collecting for his family so long that the image of UMNO is preserved. In this sense, UMNO can NEVER change; likewise parties like MCA and MIC and GERAKAN! For that matter any body who had a link with BN! The mindset to cheat and swindled the public is so engrained that no amount of talk or pleading will ever change them. To those who still hope that Najib could change, even if he REALLY wanted to, will never be able to see the daylight of it! So the slogan ” ABU’ must be in the mind of any rational Malaysian if he wanted any change in this nation!
#15 by ENDANGERED HORNBILL on Wednesday, 21 December 2011 - 10:08 pm
1 Information, 1 TV – all kinds of 1 Garbage on taxpayers money!!!!
Sample of 1 Garbage: Dr M saved nation, says najib.
Aiya, angkat bola lagi. Najib should play for QPR as angkat bola specialist.
#16 by Loh on Thursday, 22 December 2011 - 12:17 am
///Najib: I make sacrifices for the good of the people
11:25PM Dec 21 | 2
Najib Abdul Razak says he has dedicated himself to do what is best for the people for the past two-and-a-half years since assuming the post of PM.///–Malaysiakini
When a person makes sacrifices, it means that it is against his personal well being. I like to appeal to Najib please do not sacrifice himself and leave the position of Primie Minister. If Najib thought that his handling as PM is a boon to the nation, he is wrong. Najib, please leave. The harder you work, the worse it is for the country. For the sake of the country, please do not sacrifice yourself. Please leave the position and enjoy yourself like what AAB is doing. Don’t forget to make yourself an adviser of Petronas; the excuse to avail the use of private jet.
#17 by Ordinary on Thursday, 22 December 2011 - 11:00 pm
See a Malaysian Malay visited Singapore recently and compared Singapore to Malaysia: it was his long opinion about desperate UMNO or BN wanting to win coming general election. One of his opinion:
Singapura TV dipenuhi dengan program-program yang menyediakan anda dengan maklumat peristiwa-peristiwa dunia, pengetahuan mengenai apa-apa yang anda akan peduli untuk tahu dan belajar dan banyak program yang memberitahu rakyat Singapura yang hidup di luar sana adalah untuk hidup dan menikmati bertanggungjawab. Tiada ahli politik di sisi di TV mereka. Tiada apa-apa jua yang akan membenarkan mana-mana yang waras, bijak Singapura TV penonton kecewa pada sebarang cubaan oleh kerajaan Singapura untuk mencuba dan pengaruh mereka mengenai perkara-perkara politik.
TV Malaysia adalah menyedihkan dan rasa malu untuk menonton.
http://steadyaku-steadyaku-husseinhamid.blogspot.com/2011/12/takkan-melayu-hilang-di-dunia-dream-on.html?showComment=1323804454346