|
|
|
Singapore
faces blogging ire over militant escape
Melanie
Lee
Reuters
7 Mar
08
http://www.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idUSSP29412620080306
Singapore's
state-controlled media and government have come under fire from
critics and Internet bloggers for failing to give the public
important answers on the escape of a suspected Islamic
militant.
With a cynical eye cast on local newspapers such
as the pro-government daily, the Straits Times, critics say media
coverage has skirted key issues and so more people were turning
to alternatives such as blogs for a differing viewpoint.
"The
mainstream media did its job of trying to play down the most
shameful part of the incident. It is a blow to Singapore's image
as being efficient," Seah Chiang Nee, a political
commentator and former Singapore newspaper editor, told
Reuters.
"The more Internet savvy would not depend on
the mainstream media for news of what's happening in the country,
they would go to the Internet," said Seah.
Mas
Selamat bin Kastari, the alleged leader of the Singapore cell of
al Qaeda-linked Jemaah Islamiah, a group blamed for the 2002 Bali
bombings that killed 202 people, escaped on Wednesday last week
from the toilet of a detention centre.
Security experts
said the escape was embarrassing for a country that prides itself
on tight security. The escape sparked an unprecedented manhunt in
the small island and a rare apology from the government, who
blamed a "security lapse". But few further details of
his escape have since been released.
Cherian George, an
ex-Straits Times journalist and media lecturer, wrote on the
Internet that the Singapore media had not answered the
"immediate" question of how Kastari escaped.
"The
question is so natural and so obvious that you'd think anyone
barely paying attention would ask it. Unless, apparently, one
worked for the national news media," George wrote.
Loss
of credibility
George
said the absence of this question was due to media management by
the government and that the main result would be a loss of
credibility for the national media that would push readers to
other sources.
Letters to The Straits Times have also
poured scorn on the government's handling of the crisis and flow
of information.
"I am disturbed by the security lapse
... more explanation is required," wrote Rosemary Chwee Keng
Chai in a letter.
Patrick Daniel, editor-in-chief of the
Straits Times, told Reuters by email that the paper took its
responsibility to readers seriously and that George was "utterly
wrong" in his conclusion or that its journalists had never
asked questions on how Kastari escaped.
"If Cherian
had checked with us, we would have told him that we asked that
question, and many others too, many times," he said, adding
the paper had run an article exploring the issue headlined "How
did he manage to escape?" on Friday.
Reuters, a
global news and information provider, repeatedly asked the
Ministry of Home Affairs for more details on the escape but was
either referred to its initial five-line statement or was unable
to reach its spokeswoman on by telephone.
Singapore
retains a tight grip on its national newspapers through a
comprehensive legal framework that requires, among other things,
a publication permit to be granted at the discretion of the
minister. A substantial shareholder of a newspaper company must
also gain approval of a minister.
"I think that there
was tacit understanding between the government and the media,"
Catherine Lim, a prominent local author and political
commentator, told Reuters.
"It's a good working
relationship. Local media would never be as inquisitive, probing
or rambunctious as the Western media."
Some bloggers
had a field day, morphing Kastari's face onto a poster for TV
series Prison Break and saying even students doing examinations
in the city-state were accompanied to the toilet.
"We
are not like those free-wheeling and chaotic governments from
Western democracies that make their leaders accountable for every
little thing," wrote Lee Kin Mun, better known under his
online moniker 'Mr Brown', Singapore's most famous blogger.
|
|
