Malaysia...standing in the eyes of the world!

In a previous life, I used to work with the foreign media. But then, a year and a half ago, I decided to go full on in the local media, hence I am now at Astro AWANI.

Not much of a story behind the decision. It’s very clichéd actually. I wanted to feel more local stories and tell it to more local people. Basically, I wanted to serve Malaysia (chewah!).

In my opinion, for real impact, Malaysians need to be aware of the issues in their country and in their own context. Only then will they be moved to take action if it so requires.

However, news about Malaysia in the foreign media is important because it puts some highlight on to the country and its issues.

Positive news that appear on a global media platform will bring pride and happiness to the people while negative news puts pressure on whoever is responsible.

So I thought for this week, I would like to take a look at the different news stories on Malaysia that appeared in the foreign and international media.

Of course, Malaysia’s big story at the moment is the country’s recent tabling of Budget 2014 which happened last Friday, 25th October 2013.

To be frank, aside from the news agencies and wires, not that many news organisations really paid much attention to our annual budget.

The International Business Times ran a headline which focused on Malaysia’s implementation of the 6% GST and the abolishment of the country’s sugar subsidy.

The paper also acknowledged the fact that Malaysian government is trying the address the country’s fiscal deficit and improve it’s financial and economical standing.

And then there the other stories and issues that seem to always interest the global media more than financial ones – the human rights issues are what I’m referring to.

The BBC ran a story about ethnic and religious interaction (or the lack of) in Malaysia by highlighting the story of writer Uthaya Sankar, who brings people on inter-faith tours.

The tour brings interested people visiting different houses of worships such as mosques, temples and churches all around the Klang Valley.

And all of the participants of the tour who were interviewed, mainly Malaysians, believed that there is a lack of understanding between Malaysians of different ethnicities and religion.

Also in the BBC story, Chandra Muzaffar, the chairman of the 1Malaysia Foundation, said that a major stumbling block is there due to how closely religion is linked to ethnicity.

The poor state of crime control in Malaysia also played high on the international media’s story list with the New York Times giving focus on the debate of its causes.

They speculate that the soaring crime rate could be due to the country’s ethnic-based policies or a corrupt and inefficient police force.

However, they also stay quite balanced by giving attention to the explanations provided by both the ruling party government and the opposition.

The government says that the crime rate is dropping and that the danger is only a perception, while the opposition says that the government are manipulating the statistics.

Of course, the New York Times goes on to highlight that aside from ordinary people being victims of crime, even prominent government officials and politicians have been victims too.

And then, even the crime rate issue gets spun back to human-rights, with Al Jazeera International featuring a story on Malaysia’s meeting with the United Nations in Geneva.

The story talks about with how the crime rate is soaring, and the Malaysian government pushed through amendments to the Prevention of Crime Act 1959 to solve the problem.

This, of course, means that there will be detention without trial once again in the country, albeit through a slightly different process.

And since they were already on the topic of home security, the focus then went to the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Zahid Hamidi’s, support of the ‘shoot first’ policy.

And hence, the conclusion is that Malaysia’s human rights record has taken a turn from being bad to worse in the past six months.

And all this takes place while Malaysian diplomats meet up with UNHRC officials in Geneva to talk about a review on Malaysia’s human rights situation.

And so, in the past week or so, through my observations, Malaysia has been in the international media spotlight because of these several issues.

Oh! Then there’s the ban on Ke$ha holding her concert her as well. A report on CNN says that the singer claims the government cancelled her show and threatened to put her in jail.

Malaysia... standing in the eyes of the world!