Singapore: censorship city

• whycannot

  1 Dec 09, 19:05

  Singapore: censorship city

  December 1, 2009 by admin  
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  By Ben Bland for Index on Censorship

  When Reporters without Borders released its annual press freedom index last month, the Singapore government was not best pleased to find the city-state ranked 133rd out of 175 countries, below the likes of Kenya and Congo.

  Singapore’s law minister, K Shanmugam, dismissed the low ranking as “quite absurd and divorced from reality”, insisting to a group of visiting American lawyers that Singapore is not “a repressive state” and does not “unfairly target the press”.

  “Our approach on press reporting is simple: The press can criticise us, our policies. We do not seek to condemn that,” he said.

  While reading his comments in the state-controlled Straits Times newspaper, I was busy packing my suitcase as I’d recently found out that I had become “the latest on a long list of foreign journalists who have been targeted by the government for their news coverage”, in the words of the Committee to Protect Journalists.

  After a year as a freelance journalist in Singapore, contributing to publications such as The Economist, the Daily Telegraph and the British Medical Journal, my application to renew my work visa was rejected without warning, explanation or right of appeal.

  The law minister’s comments might have appeared hypocritical to most people but if I had written as much while still in Singapore, I would have landed myself with a ruinous defamation suit.
  As well as forcing out foreign correspondents, destroying the careers of local journalists and maintaining ownership over all the domestic newspapers and news broadcasters, the Singapore government is fond of using its stringent libel laws to further restrict the freedom of the press.

  Two weeks ago, the soon-to-close Far Eastern Economic Review was forced to pay S$405,000 (£177,000) in damages and costs to the prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong, and his father, Singapore’s founding father, Lee Kuan Yew, after being found guilty of defaming the Lees in a 2006 article based on an interview with Chee Soon Juan, an opposition politician.

  Rupert Murdoch’s Dow Jones, which owns the publication, denied any wrongdoing but said it was paying up to avoid a protracted legal battle.

  Dow Jones, which has chosen to locate the Southeast Asian headquarters of its newswire division in the tightly-controlled city-state, said that the ruling would not deter it from its core mission “to provide fair and timely reporting and commentary on matters of importance from around the world, including in Singapore”.

  However, most working journalists in Singapore agree that the government’s persistent use of libel suits against global news organisations such as The Economist, the International Herald Tribune, the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg has had a chilling effect on press freedom.

  Such a heavy-handed approach may mean that the government loses the battle in the short term, coming under fire for showing such intolerance toward mild criticism from reputable publications.

  However, the government has won the war because international news organisations have, by and large, been silenced by the threat of having to pay substantial damages or having their access to the lucrative Singapore market curtailed.

  Stories that quote an opposition politician or civil society expert are few and far between, while hard-hitting investigative journalism is virtually non-existent.

  The real victims of this repression are not foreign correspondents like myself, who can re-locate, or large news organisations such as Dow Jones, which can afford to bear the costs of an occasional libel suit, but Singaporeans.

  For the inevitable result of the government’s regular attacks on the foreign press and its exercise of direct control over the domestic media is that a corrosive atmosphere of self-censorship is all-pervasive.

  In researching this story, I spoke to many Singaporean and foreign journalists, trying to find someone who had a more positive view of the government’s approach to the press. But even those who support some of the government’s restrictions were not willing to comment on the record for fear of somehow upsetting the powers-that-be and jeopardising their livelihood.

  Although I wrote about some sensitive topics in Singapore such as rising crime and the challenges of an ageing population, I always believed that I was operating within the bounds of what was acceptable.

  However, the ruling People’s Action Party, which has maintained a vice-like grip on power since independence from Britain in 1959, deliberately refuses to clarify what journalists can and cannot write about.

  By keeping the boundaries of what is permissible opaque, the government ensures that most journalists and other commentators err on the side of caution — especially Singaporeans, who have much more to lose than their foreign counterparts if they fall foul of the authorities.

  This self-censorship is, in the words of Milos Forman, the Czech film director who lived under the yoke of the Nazis and the Communists, “the worst evil…because that twists spines, that destroys my character because I have to think something else and say something else, I have to always control myself.” – Index on Censorship

  Republished from Index on Censorship on 30 November 2009
  Ben Bland is a freelance journalist. He was based in Singapore between October 2008 and October 2009. He blogs at http://www.asiancorrespondent.com/the-asia-file

• whycannot

  1 Dec 09, 19:46

  Ejected U.K journalist continues to criticize Singapore in international media

  December 1, 2009 by admin  
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  Written by Our Correspondent

  U.K. journalist Benjamin Bland who was “ejected” unceremoniously from Singapore after being denied a visa by the authorities have continued to criticize the Singapore government for its low tolerance for media freedom.

  Bland worked for a year as a freelance journalist in Singapore, contributing to publications such as the Economist, the Daily Telegraph and the British Medical Journal.

  His application to renew his work visa was rejected without warning, explanation or right of appeal despite intervention by the British High Commission in Singapore.

  Unhappy that he was barred from working in Singapore without any valid reasons, Bland who had since returned to England, wrote in a few international papers and blogs lambasting the Singapore government for its inexplicit actions.

  The Singapore government has yet to provide an official explanation on why Bland’s visa was not renewed. The controversy was not reported in the state media either.

  Writing in The Guardian, a U.K daily, Bland poured scorn on Singapore’s ambition to become a media hub:

  “Unfriendly reporters are jailed, assaulted or assassinated by the governments of Burma, Iran and Sri Lanka. Singapore, with pretensions to being a global “media hub”, prefers tools of repression that are more subtle, yet have the same chilling effect on free speech.”

  Bland claimed that he did not dwell on any taboo topics which would cross the out-of-bound markers:

  “Although I reported on some sensitive issues such as rising crime, the ageing population and business links with Burma, I did not break any of the taboos that normally lead to a government reprisal – namely criticising Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s founding father, or his son, the prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong,” he said.

  He also launched a tirade against the repression of press freedom in Singapore:

  “As well as forcing out foreign correspondents, destroying the careers of local journalists and maintaining ownership over all the domestic newspapers and news broadcasters, the Singapore government is fond of using its stringent libel laws to further restrict the freedom of the press.”

  Besides the Guardian, Bland also wrote about his predicament in The Asian Correspondent, Asia Sentinel and Index on Censorship. His case was highlighted by New York-based NGO Committee to Protect Journalists.

  Bland’s protests are likely to fall on deaf ears. The Singapore government is unlikely to give him the explanation he is seeking and neither will it affect the editorial policy of media organizations in the country which have to toe the official line in order to remain in operation.

  As Bland himself puts it succinctly:

  “Such a heavy-handed approach may mean that the government loses the battle in the short term, coming under fire for showing such intolerance toward mild criticism from reputable publications.

  However, the government has won the war because international news organisations have, by and large, been silenced by the threat of having to pay substantial damages or having their access to the lucrative Singapore market curtailed.”

  Law Minister Shanmugan criticized the Singapore media’s pathetic ranking by Reporters without Borders as “absurd and quite divorced from reality.”

  Its ranking will probably fall by another few notches next year after the callous treatment the Singapore government has dished out to Bland.

• whycannot

  1 Dec 09, 20:10

  抓��糊民主观念作文章

  November 30, 2009 by Lee Chong  
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  作者：《中国时报》

  她应该是新加�政府的无情批评者��决�对者，她自认如此，许多新加�人也视她为如此，西方媒体记者更将她当作稀有的�政府人士。她就是新加�知�作家─林�音 (Catherine Lim)。

  两个多月�，《国际�锋论�报(International Herald Tribune)》曾刊登题为「一�浪漫作家猛戳新加�大家长制�的长篇文章，介�林�音如何勇敢批评新加�政治制度乃至「大家长��光耀。

  感觉上，林�音无异于穿�盔甲的��诃德，骑�瘦驴手�长矛，英勇冲�那个巨大的�正在旋转的风车。

  真实的情况�是，她�到新加�政府时，竟毫无矫饰地说：「我认为是世界上最好的政府。�对于�当是她批评的对象，�常被西方媒体�述为���放�幕�主导新加�政治的�光耀，她说：「我钦佩他，他是真正有�识的政治家。�

  那么，她究竟�对什么？

  林�音说：「新加�政府还有改善的空间，改善我所谓的『人民行动党（执政党）治�模��，�制衡�应该属于人民，实行真正的民主开放，毕竟民主政治是人类所能拥有的最好制度。�

  林�音�认为西方的民主制度�以照�，也�希望新加����律宾��湾，她说：「一定�以找出一些方法，例如，我们应该�许街头示�。�。

  林�音称自己为「�外的作家��「�外的政治评论家�，因为这两个身分都并�她刻�追求。

  一��四年，�作栋刚接任总�，「�作栋是个很好�很绅士的人，但已�任的�光耀，��株巨大��树，笼罩新加�，我在�观察，看有什么��，结果一切如昔。�

  于是林�音写了第一篇评论，指称新加�百姓很感谢政府所�一切，��喜欢这些领导人。这个观点让当年很少�到�对声音的新加�人大为惊讶，甚至被形容为「凯瑟�．林（林�音的英文�）事件�。

  在一个专制国家进行批评，难��会�到政府的压制或骚扰？林�音说：「没有，从�没有。�在林�音的观念里，新加�政府这么好，但如果�作改�，廿��年�，�机就会出现。

  「人民行动党已治�新加�四�多年，好�也没出现什么�机。�林�音�混地回答：「但�管一个政府多有效率，在政治上若�能更纯熟细致，人民迟早会弃离，新加�就会崩溃。�

  也许这就是新加��政府声音的困难之处。这个政府太负责�太有效率�把人民照顾得太好，�对者几乎找�到�力点，�能抓��糊的民主观念作文章。

  ��：http://news.chinatimes.com