Malaysians fight for freedom of press

The Malaysian government says media freedom is guaranteed by the constitution and yet many laws control the flow of information on the country's newspapers, radio and television.

Malaysia's freedom of press has been ranked a low 131 out of 175 countries by Reporters Without Borders, an international NGO.

But to get around regulations, journalists have been turning to alternative forms of media.

Al Jazeera's Gerald Tan reports from the capital, Kuala Lumpur.

[May 3, 2010]

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• asia-pacificnews
• malaysia
• kuala
• lumpur
• journalists
• freedom
• of
• press
• media
• gerald
• tan
• aljazeera

[rochelimit55555]

Malaysian government: racist

[hAhan17]

not only malaysia, even singapore, our media was suppressed by the govt, we talk abt transparency, which is sometimes, not true... the recent accident is when AJE talks about homeless in singapore, then, was taken out by the govt and state media... our press too, dont dare to talk bad abt our PAP cough* i mean govt...

[giriisindahouse]

Malaysiakini is an opposition-sided site. But it has an important role so that people can hear from both sides.

[LanLbn]

I'm malaysian. I read both news online and from the mass media. I certainly dont read politics news in the paper cuz is full of bs. Thank god the gov promised not to filter the internet or surely this country will turn upside down.

[hotmail2101]

French ppl of different races speaks french. same goes to german, spanish, the list goes on. c'mon, we're msians. speak bahasa 2 me or manglish would do at least.;).lol.

[hotmail2101]

@pionisgood i'm amazed by indonesians. different races speak national language wth pride. In msia, english fluency is highly regarded.a malay wld speak 2 a chinese or indian in english bcs they think de latter two is comfortable in english. Chinese n indian, even knowing bahasa, wld reply in english,lol.Wat I dun get is tat BM is the national language, so ppl shd communicate in it more. In UK, english is the national language, tat's y ppl r expected 2 grasp b4 bng allowed 2 stay...duuhhh...

[meow91able]

@pionisgood well...when you met new people..you had to speak in english.........you cant jus like strait goin to your own language...they will be like.....wah??....

everyone of us live in malaysia learns english.nothing to be weird if they learn or speak in new language..cuz it good..eazy to talk to people in other out of coutrys. (im a suck speller)

[pionisgood]

@meow91able ya..i mean what i see in malaysia when i was in KL last year that..most of malay people speak "SINGLISH" and the chinesse didn't want to speak malay and same with indian that speak tamil... and sometimes i heard a malay speak "arabian" and when malay,chinesse,indian met...they speak English.....i just don't get it cause in Indonesia every province has their own unique language..but for daily life we speak Bahasa Indonesia ..even the chinesse and Indian speak bahasa Indonesia too,,

[meow91able]

@pionisgood why can they?...

[pionisgood]

how can one nation speak 4 language ?? what a funny country???

[JoethiGanga]

commendable effort by AlJazeera! Keep the torch burning!

[nadlovesheechul]

STFU, aljazeera present everything except the truth, same goes for cnn & fox. they know nothing, but yet still making silly headlines. no wonder their offices are being attacked frequently by the viewers. and talking about media freedom? HAHA! what's with the disabling comments of the videos.