©New
Sunday Times (Used by permission)
by Tunku Abdul Aziz
AS I settled down to start on my Sunday column, this time in the invigorating
cold of the Melbourne winter, I wondered what I should touch on.
A thought crossed my mind that it could possibly be
therapeutic for my soul to reflect upon the nature and purpose of being a
mainstream columnist in today's Malaysian society.
Twenty–two years of tight control of the media have had the effect of creating
public cynicism about government policies and intentions.
All this surely cannot be good for us in the long–term. That many more people
repeat what the blogs are putting out as the absolute truth than those who quote
mainstream media reports is symptomatic of the mood of the country as a whole
during these unsettled times.
It is a dangerous development that must be addressed imaginatively on an urgent
basis.
Governing the multiracial, multicultural and multi–religious nation that is
Malaysia has never been a vicarage tea party or a Sunday picnic at the best of
times.
In this current political environment, the difficulties are compounded by the
government having to pit itself against "cyber guerilla" forces whose rights to
operate in cyber–space are unmolested because of the protection given them under
the law.
It seems to me that the government has again found its flank exposed; it is
trapped in a protracted argument without end in a desperate search for answers
to the Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim saga that the nation has a right to know.
Argument Without End is, of course, the title of a book by Robert McNamara on
the Vietnam War in which he rationalised his role as its chief architect.
It is unfortunate that the present government has been left to reap, by default,
what can be fairly described as a harvest of discontent, disgrace and dishonour.
The years 2003– 2007 can only be viewed, against the circumstances that we now
see developing before our eyes, as wasted years as far as effective reforms were
concerned.
The credibility gap has now grown beyond control. And, on present form, judging
by the clumsy, tentative and muddled attempts by ministers and other officials
to isolate what they regard as truth from fiction, I am not in the least bit
sanguine that the government still retains the initiative to effectively
challenge the problem posed by the growing influence of the blogs.
What all this has done is to allow the bloggers –– the overwhelming majority of
whom, sadly, are adventurers of sorts –– to set themselves up as the sole
purveyors of truth.
It is not surprising that there are people who believe columnists are told what
and how to write and that this is subject to censorship.
When I was invited to write this column two years ago, I asked if there were
editorial restrictions on what I could write.
There were none, I was assured, except that if there were anything that could
possibly be considered or construed as libellous, an article would be rejected.
Media sceptics choose what they want to believe, but that is their right.
In the two years I have been writing, every Sunday without fail, I have only had
two articles withdrawn for legal reasons, and I am grateful to the editors for
educating me in pitfalls of the laws of libel.
If that is censorship, then I am all for more of the same. It is in honouring
the rules and laws that govern the members of a profession that they will be
able to conduct their work in an orderly and ethical manner.
This is what ultimately sets the mainstream media practitioners apart from the
rest. This is the difference between a code of practice and the law of the
jungle that seems to dominate cyber–space.
The sceptics should not allow their deep–seated ambivalent, or, worse still,
their ingrained anti–establishment attitude, to impair and distort their ability
to judge the actions of others on merit rather than preconceived ideas.
We, all of us without exception, have at some time or other, fallen prey to this
human condition or frailty. We can cure it, though, if we are prepared to
embrace the most important truth of all in this context, and that is, that which
is apparent is not always real.
Malaysia is still groping in desperate search of identity. It is still very much
a society in transition, subsisting in the main on suspicion, intolerance, and
prejudice. It is still a society that is not totally at ease with its ability to
make the transition from form to substance.
For all his perceived shortcomings, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has given
us the freedom and the space to go with it that we knew belonged to us.
For all that, the intolerance of dissenting views, a legacy from those unhappy
years in the past, has now become a feature of public life in this country.
The government has an urgent responsibility to set the tone and develop a
climate of confidence and trust before its legitimacy and effectiveness to
govern is taken out of its hands, dictated and controlled by the new media
buccaneers lurking behind the cyber–curtain.
Government by inaction is what the country can do without now, and that is why
with all that is going on around us –– the ongoing Anwar saga, and the events
surrounding the Altantuya case are just two examples –– it is a matter of
concern that senior members of the government seem far more interested in their
chances of winning coveted positions in the coming party leadership elections
than in arresting the worsening state of affairs in our country in political,
social and economic terms.
A balance has to be struck between personal and public interests.
The smart thing to do in the present climate is to err on the side of the public
good.
And, while you are pondering the appropriate course of action to adopt to put
matters right in our society, do come up with something imaginative to prove to
all the sceptics out there that the bloggers, in spite of their claims, do not
hold a copyright on truth.
The writer is a former special adviser to the United Nations
secretary–general on ethics. He can be contacted at
[email protected]