Rupert Murdoch famously dropped the BBC from his Star TV to get in the good books of China, but the same consideration does not seem to apply to Singapore.
He has not stopped his newspapers from taking pot shots at Singapore.
Instead of a straightforward court report on the libel case brought by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his father, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, against their arch-critic, Chee Soon Juan, here is what appeared in the Wall Street Journal:
Lee Kuan Yew’s Singapore can rightly be proud of many achievements, but full democracy is not one of them. The city-state he founded in 1965 and led as Prime Minister until 1990 is economically prosperous and its citizens enjoy a range of freedoms. Political dissent is not among them.
Which makes a recent David-vs.-Goliath exchange between one of the country’s few opposition politicians and Mr. Lee worth noting. The dialogue took place in a courtroom and is therefore privileged — which means we can report on it without risking a lawsuit, which Mr. Lee often files against critics.
The Australian, another Murdoch paper, made its view of the case equally plain. Its headline said:
Democracy limps out of courtroom in a Singapore sling.
Murdoch newspapers have their own axe to grind. As the Wall Street Journal acknowledged:
Mr. Lee has never lost a libel suit. He and his son are currently suing the Far Eastern Economic Review, a sister publication of this newspaper, and its editor, Hugo Restall.
That too involves Chee. Anyone reading Restall’s interview with Chee, which is still available online, will see it is hardly complimentary to the Lees.
To be fair to the Wall Street Journal, it did say it did not know what Singaporeans thought of the two cases:
It’s hard to know what Singaporeans make of all this . Mr. Lee is widely revered as the father of their country, and Mr. Chee is often scorned for his aggressive tactics. But at least, thanks to the Internet, they are able to read the exchange and make up their own minds.
There is that freedom in Singapore — and more.
The Wall Street Journal failed to note the opposition is getting more coverage in the Singapore media than it used to — and it is not invariably a hatchet job.
The freesheet Today published an article on Chee which quoted his friends as well as his critics. It was an objective article in a newspaper owned by the sovereign wealth fund, Temasek Holdings, which is headed by Prime Minister Lee’s wife, Ms Ho Ching.
The Wall Street Journal and the Australian, on the other hand, were quite partisan — as indeed they might be, given their sister publication Far Eastern Economic Review’s wrangle with Singapore’s leaders.
Related posts:
You call that article on Dr Chee in Today an objective article ? You have lost your right to criticise others.