Tuesday, June 24, 2008

THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA – WHY SO MUTE AND DUMB?

So the bloggers have made their day by spilling out RPK’s stunning revelation regarding the direct involvement of Rosmah Mansor aka Imelda Rosmah, and her cohorts in the chilling murder of the Mongolian beauty, Altuntuya.

The whole world has the story now, and I even received a phone call from my New Yorker friend late last night, to verify the truth regarding the story. He told me that he obtained the news from another of his Malaysian friend. If the news had traveled to New York, I see no reason why the news has not reached London, Paris, Oslo or even Kenya.

A blogger friend also called to say that he received more than 91,000 hits for a story he wrote relating to the murder. That’s how important and concern bloggers view the story, and the number of hits is a clear indication of the importance of the story to the concerned public. Like all good movies, viewers are attracted to big names. Similarly in this story, viewers were attracted because the big name happened to be Rosmah Mansor, the darling wife of Dato Seri Najib Tun Razak.

But what of the mainstream media, especially those that are owned by political parties affiliated to the government?

Admittedly, I am not a loyal subscriber of the NST or any of its dailies. But for this shocking story that has made us grasp in wonder, I thought surely NST will have the story flashed out on its front pages and in bold letters. I frantically browsed through the NST website , and to my disappointment, NST suddenly ‘ran out of ink’ to run the story.

I now wonder, if only it was RPK who was involved in the murder, how would the NST react? I think it will be a ‘field day’ of reporting for the NST, and also for the government controlled electronic media. Just watch how the media will react when RPK goes to court to answer his charges for sedition this October.

So please pardon my language, if I call you the mainstream media (both print and electronic) mute and dumb. You certainly have lost credibility in the eyes of all Malaysians, in fair, just and accurate reporting.

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