5 hard clampdowns on Malaysian freedom of speech in last 3 weeks

The past three weeks have been an undoubtedly challenging time for ALL Malaysians, what with our Ringgit dropping like a rock, cabinet members being reshuffled at will, and a massive RM42 billion hole (and growing) called 1MDB yet to be uncovered. We say hole cos it’s like a black hole of information. Investments, questions, business newspapers and even suspects go in, but very little actually comes out.

Coincidentally mebe, it’s also been a really challenging time for your local media covering it. Not for shortage of stories, of course (we can barely keep up), but with new fears arising everyday about our rights to bring information to you – the public. BUT why is it important that the media can report without fear!? Well we’ll let our homey Najib tell you that one.

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Anyways, in that case, this article is for you, homey. We’ll update this list as it (hopefully doesn’t) develops. Here’s a quick recap of what’s happened to the media in just the last two weeks – in chronological order starting with…

July 19th: The start of neverending attacks on the Sarawak Report

Relevance to you: Losing your #1 source of 1MDB gossipz

The Sarawak Report didn’t start with 1MDB. In fact, it seldom involved itself with the goings on in KL – more focused on the East Malaysian side of its namesake. Its previous claim to fame was the reveal of Sarawak’s Chief Minister, Taib Mahmud’s massive wealth and corruption network.

However, last year… they started covering Rosmah’s son’s investment into The Wolf of Wall Street movie (and were threatened with lawsuit), and from there on in, got sucked big time into the whole 1MDB saga, eventually culminating in a secret source revealing to them alleged intimate details like emails and contracts between 1MDB and Petrosaudi.

After that, the authorities came out guns blazing.

July 19th – MCMC officially blocks the Sarawak Report until 1MDB investigations are concluded, redirecting traffic to a page similar to the one we used for our April Fool’s article. In support of freedom of speech, we wrote an article instructing people how to continue viewing it (here’s BM version).

July 26th – The Sarawak Report site down, suspectedly because of a hack.

August 4th – An arrest warrant is issued for Clare Newcastle Brown, and will be sent to international police.

But it didn’t matter too much since people were still accessing it pretty easily and whatever came out on Sarawak Report was immediately mirrored on a dozen other media sites… and one newspaper.

July 24th: The Edge newspaper kena shut down

Relevance to you: Your dad need to learn to use internet

In case you haven’t heard… on July 20th, local financial daily The Edge published a super-exposé on 1MDB (front page shown above) which you can read here if you’re subscribed to their digital news site — and you should be, if only to show respect for their massive cojones (which is Mexican for “printing presses”).

Essentially, The Edge published an editor’s note that mentioned that story “could be our last” and almost dared the government to close them down. Which, unfortunately, they did. Unlike online publications, newspapers require a permit to publish, and 5 days after that article, our Home Ministry (KDN) basically revoked The Edge’s permit for 3 months.

It was a sad moment when our regular newspaper guy came to the office and told us…

“Sorry bro… no Edge anymore. Maybe you can subscribe to Focus Malaysia or something instead?” – CILISOS office newspaper dude

Here’s what our editor wrote in his column last week addressing the issue.

“While we don’t necessarily condone everything The Edge does (or understand it fully, like the image on the right), what we’re standing for here isn’t their coverage of 1MDB, but THEIR RIGHT to cover. As a democracy, one of the most important things to champion is freedom of information – be it from The Edge, the NST or even Ridhuan Tee.” – Chak, Editor-in-chief, CILISOS

And if you’re not convinced about the massive size of their “printing presses”, they also handed over all their 1MDB-related documents in their possession to Bank Negara (part of the task force investigating 1MDB) and the Commercial Crime Investigation Department.

So balls. But shortly after…

July 24th: Authorities warn local media to tread carefully

Relevance to you: Your news outlets might not be able to tambah pedas as much. In fact, we might have to scoop out the cili entirely.

“Any party found to be republishing content from Sarawak Report, which has been blocked, will also be subject to (the Communications & Multimedia Act 1998)” – Zulkarnain Mohd Yasin, Enforcement and surveillance division chief of MCMC, Malaysiakini

Barely 24 hours after the shutdown, the MCMC held a briefing with online media editors in Putrajaya this morning, including Malaysiakini, The Malaysian Insider, Utusan Online, and many others warning them to not republish content from SR. They warned that action would be taken against those who “spread of false or inaccurate information that could undermine the peace and harmony of the country, especially in terms of economy and national security,”

UPDATE: New Communica­tions and Multimedia  Minister Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak says that he wants to propose for online news portals to be registered in similar fashion to newspapers at the parliment sitting in October.

“It has nothing to do with (1MDB). We want comprehensive amendments. The laws were introduced in 1998 and, since then, there have been a lot of developments. “We must take into account these developments. Many countries also amend their cyber laws to ensure that social media do not cause problems.” Datuk Seri Salleh Said Keruak, new MCMC head

Shortly after he got promoted to Deputy Prime Minister position after a shock change in the Malaysian cabinet, Zahid Hamidi was quick to reinforce the position.

“Do not expect me to give warnings. Expect me to take action,” – Zahid Hamidi, newly appointed Deputy Prime Minister

In fact, Zahid might be referring to more than just official media.

Aug 2nd: Najib warning EVERYbadeh to tread carefully

Relevance to you: You might not even be able to say your peace on WhatsApp, Facebook or any other media.

Prime Minister Najib Razak has instructed the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission to streamline the laws and step up enforcement to check dissemination of slander on social media. He said if such slanders were allowed to fester, it would alter the mindset of the people and create a state of “trial by social media”. – The Straits Times

Shortly after, Najib’s newly appointed Minister in the PMO talked about convening an emergency parlimentary sitting to “amend various laws governing Internet and media usage such as the Communications and Multimedia Act 1998 and the Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984.”

“I fully support what our Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said on the issue of slander on social media earlier today. These changes need to be made because of the lies which have poisoned the minds of the people resulting in a negative perception towards the Government,” – Datuk Seri Azalina Othman Said

Actually, this wasn’t even the first warning. The MCMC’s Facebook issued one waaaaaaay back on July 9th, warning that anyone caught spreading false information about 1MDB would be charged under the same Communications and Multimedia Act 1998, specifically including WhatsApp.

They also warned that they were actively monitoring irresponsible social media users. One user named Sharifah Sofia Syed Rashid has already been called on by the police for her posts (although not just for 1MDB posts, but MH370 ones as well).

Thankfully, at least they did say that parodies like the 1MDB movie posters were okay, which technically means our featured images are okay, and so are our friends at fakemalaysianews.com.

How do you feel about all this?

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We voted to be brave. At this point in time, us here at CILISOS are starting to feel a bit less balanced than usual – because of the sheer disregard for public opinion going on now. And you know what happens if we stay quiet now.

As we mentioned in our editor’s note last week… “When someone pushes a boundary like this, it’s kind of a test. The Edge pushing their headline was a test to see how the authorities would respond, and NOW, the authorities are pushing to see how we will respond.” If Malaysians stay quiet now, you can pretty much expect more of what’s already happened in the last two weeks.

However, there are positive signs ahead.

Jails will be full… https://t.co/Ln96H86nLi

— Marina Mahathir (@netraKL) July 9, 2015

And it’s true too. People haven’t seemed to back down. Even on Najib’s FB page, #najibletakjwtanPM appears in the thousands on every page.

It’s time to make ugaiz voices heard

As we mentioned in our editor’s note, media publications can’t be the only ones speaking loudly. We depend on people like you to stand next to us – to show that you want us around. Because of that, here are somethings that you can do beyond sharing this article, of course.

1. Sign up for RM30 to The Edge digital. Doesn’t even matter if you have no interest in business news whatsoever. Show them you’re proud of what they did for the country.

2. Attend one of the rallies happening this month. Bring your friends

• Saturday, Aug 8th – #Attheedge Rally at Central Market Saturday, 11am – To walk with your fellow media to oppose all these clampdowns of freedom of speech happening right now. Organised by Journalists, with help from some NGOs like BERSIH. (full disclosure, CILISOS editor Chak is also on the committee)
• Saturday Aug 29th – BERSIH 4.0 – The rock-concert that everyone is kinda looking forward to. The BERSIH team have had a massive impact on Malaysians walking together to ask for a cleaner government, and this is the long-awaited sequel.

Do join one, if not two of these events – to show that Malaysians will not allow our voices to be silenced. It’s now or never.

We are all #attheedge.