The Malaysian Insider

KUALA LUMPUR, June 1 – The race is on for the Najib administration to have a bigger footprint in the one space where it has not been able to dominate or influence discourse – the Internet.

Close associates of the Prime Minister are on the cusp of acquiring 75 per cent of the Malay Mail, one of the country’s oldest newspapers. The Singapore Business Times reported on Friday that the new owners plan a change in editorial and business direction – printing a limited number of free newspapers and pursuing an aggressive online strategy.

Also to be launched soon is a news portal, the Malaysian Mirror, the brainchild of supporters of MCA president Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat.

The financiers of this portal feel that the MCA leader and the second biggest component party has not received fair coverage by the alternative media and want to redress this situation.

They have tapped former journalists from mainstream media to run the Malaysian Mirror.

Since Election 2008, there has been a new found respect for the alternative media. The conventional wisdom among Barisan Nasional officials is that the ruling coalition lost the non-Malay vote and could not connect with Malaysians aged 21 and 30 because it abdicated control of the Internet to the more tech-savvy Pakatan Rakyat.

In a typical knee-jerk reaction, many Umno/BN politicians set up blogs to reach out, without stopping to appreciate that a large swathe of Malaysians deserted the ruling coalition in March 2008 because of a combination of broken promises, excesses by ruling coalition politicians, mounting frustration with the skewed policy-making under the New Economic Policy and inflation.

More than a year later, BN leaders are troubled by the fact that they are still getting slaughtered in blogosphere and unable to influence discourse in the Internet. They believe that this dire situation cannot be allowed to continue, given that the Internet penetration in Malaysia (17 per cent) will increase dramatically when broadband services are made available across the country.

Also worrying is another statistic. Authorities expect up to two million new voters to be registered by the time the next general elections are held in 2013 and surveys show that this age group depends primarily on the alternative media for their information and news.

Like every recent Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak has moved to ensure that the mainstream media will be loyal and supportive of his administration. He appointed former Utusan Malaysia editor Datuk Johan Jaafar as his media controller, putting him in charge of the Media Prima group. Several editorial changes have also been made at Umno-controlled newspapers.

Najib’s supporters have also reached out and managed to persuade several bloggers who were strident in their criticism of Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to become administration-friendly.

Still, supporters and officials of the PM believes that he needs other platforms to air views and government policies to the online population, and this is where the new Malay Mail could play a role.

The Singapore Business Times reported that Redberry, a company controlled by businessman Siew Ka Wei and Mohamad Al Amin Abdul Majid, will acquire

75 per cent of the tabloid. It is likely that they will assume the paper’s debt of RM11 million.

Media Prima will no longer have any interest in the newspaper while businessman Ibrahim Mohamed Nor will hold a 25 per cent stake.

Siew and Mohamad Al-Amin are likely to get advertising support from the country’s government-linked companies.

Officials claiming to speak on behalf of Najib have been contacting GLCs over the past few days, urging them to significantly increase their advertising expenditure with the Malay Mail.

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