To Blog or Not to Blog in Singapore

Alex Au, a prominent Singaporean blogger, wrote this article for the Asia Times Online, succintly describing how local bloggers and online writers have taken to the Internet as a alternative media for freedom of expression in a country where the mainstream media is government-controlled and any of hint dissent dealt with swiftly.

The results of a poll conducted by the Media Development Authority (MDA) of Singapore have shown that almost half of 15-19 year olds and 46% of 20-24 year olds maintain a blog. While most blogs are online diaries, many are also provide incisive social and political commentary. With the General Elections (GE) looming in 2006, bloggers were still wary of the Sintercom affair in 2001 when the government insisted that the politically-oriented website register itself with the MDA. Rather than open themselves to potential lawsuits, Sintercom chose to shut itself down.

However, in 2006, the increase of political coverage in blogs leading up to the 2006 GE saw no move on the MDA’s part; this inaction could possibly be due to the government’s realisation that it could little to stem the rising tide of blogging activity, short of employing the short leash it does on the mainstream media.

While so far the government has not yet employed its ‘arsenal of laws and regulations aimed at curtailing critical political commentary’ upon blogs, the freedom that local bloggers experience now might not last forever.

Therefore, if Singapore wishes to maintain its goal to be a ‘cutting-edge, knowledge-driven economy’, it must allow the leeway for digital media to flourish.

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Citizen Journalism in Singapore

Singapore Angle on June 26 2006 discussed the phenomenon of citizen journalism following the upwards trend of blogging activity of political content during the 2006 General Elections.

Bernard Leong, writer of the article, states that two dimensions of blogging concerns freedom of speech and credibility of the bloggers, both of which are ‘intrinsically related’. And as I have expressed earlier in previous posts regarding the seditious bloggers, Leong (2006) states:

‘The establishment viewed the freedom of speech available in the internet as a threat. Rules and regulations are continuously reviewed and created even today… The central reason they cite for notion that bloggers are credible is that these writers hide behind the mask of anonymity.

The association of anonymity with the lack of credibility is a non-sequitur. If someone writes a trashy article, his credibility will be lowered as compared to someone who writes an articulate and well reasoned article — whether or not either writer is anonymous. Think about it this way: are you willing to trust someone who spouts vulgarities over every paragraph on his or her piece or someone who writes professionally or with social etiquette? The establishment forgets that there is a mechanism of self-correction involved in the very nature of the internet’.

Leong makes a very persuasive case about how a blog can be used in the context of citizen journalism in Singapore. This is how a blogger can attain credibility through his postings, utilising the freedom of speech through blogging as a media.

I find Leong’s notion that credibility is attached directly to the logic and reasoning of the author, his anonymity notwithstanding, very interesting. We have seen several anonymous bloggers such as Mr Wang and Mollymeek being popular and highly credible within the Singapore blogosphere, despite never having fully disclosed their identities. This speaks of maturity and discernment within the community.

Leong ends his article with an optimistic view of the future of blogging: ‘My hope is that the new media of blogging will help to raise awareness about issues and help to construct an acceptable social identity for those who want to engage in social and political debate’.

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Blogging Activity Up During GE Campaigning

Channel NewsAsia reported on the heightened blog activity in the run-up to the General Elections (GE) 2006.

According to the report:

One indication was that before Parliament was dissolved, the number of blog articles on the election numbered about 20 a day.

This number doubled to more than 40 after Parliament was dissolved in the run-up to Nomination Day, and it averaged over 190 during the nine-day election campaign.

The interest has not waned even after the results, with 195 blog articles posted daily since Polling Day.
One blog received about 5,000 to 6,000 hits, double the usual number.

With Singapore providing such easy Internet accessibility, it is no wonder that we seeing this trend of blogging activity happening here.

Perhaps it is not that Singaporeans are apathetic in regard to local politics, but rather finding a suitable avenue for them to express their opinions without fear of reprisal. With almost no barrier of entry to set up a blog, a blog author can begin publishing their opinions online, inviting feedback from readers, hence creating healthy and lively political discourse.

As Goh Kheng Wee, managing director of NexLabs, said in the report:

“I think it’s the first time citizen journalism is really taking its form in the Singapore election. Of course in the last election in 2001, blogging did not exist. Citizen journalism — probably the best expression is in blogs and it was very prevalent in this election here. A lot of people took it upon themselves, felt empowered by technology to report what they see, feel, hear from each election, giving detailed accounts online with the hope of sharing that account as accurately as possible.”

We are witnessing a ’subtle transformation’ of our political culture, as the Internet begins opening up as an alternative media for the public to discuss and to inform opinions as they would have probably not done so in the past.

I am certain that we will see this kind of blogging activity the next time the GE comes around.

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Mr Brown: ‘Partisan Player of Politics’?

Mr Brown, aka Lee Kin Mun, one of Singapore’s pioneer bloggers who remains one of the most popular in the local blogging community, contributed the article ‘S’poreans are fed, up with progress!’ on 30 June 2006 for his weekly column in Today newspaper, a free mainstream daily in Singapore. It highlighted the increase in costs of living – such as electricity tariffs and taxi fares that were introduced after the General Election in 2006.

Subsquently on July 3 2006, K Bhavani, press secretary for the Ministry for Information, Communication and the Arts (MICA) issued a strongly-worded reply to Today in response to Mr Brown’s article. To quote Ms Bhavani (2006): ‘It is not the role of journalists or newspapers in Singapore to champion issues, or campaign for or against the Government. If a columnist presents himself as a non-political observer, while exploiting his access to the mass media to undermine the Government’s standing with the electorate, then he is no longer a constructive critic, but a partisan player in politics’.

On July 6 2006, Mr Brown revealed that his weekly column was suspended by Today.

Minister for MICA, Dr Lee Boon Yang, said on 12 July 2006: ‘Mr Brown’s comment was not posted in his blog. If he had posted the same comment on his blog, we’ll treat it as part of the internet chatter and we would have just let it be! But he didn’t post it – he wrote it and publish it in a mainstream newspaper! That’s the difference!’ (Channel NewsAsia 2006).

Therefore, we see a disturbing dichotomy in opinion regarding the credibility of opinions published online in blogs. As I had discussed in an earlier post, bloggers were charged for seditious remarks; so where do we draw the line as what is merely ‘internet chatter’ and what is considered credible public opinion or civil and rational discourse?

Bloggers Charged Under Sedition Act for Racist Remarks

On 12 September 2005, for the first time in Singapore’s history, two local bloggers were charged for sedition for posting racist comments online. According to lawyers, the last time the Sedition Act was invoked in Singapore was ten years ago.

The offenders involved were 25-year-old Nicholas Lim Yew and 27-year-old Benjamin Koh Song Huat who had posted the racist comments on an online forum and on their blog site. Their sentences were passed on October 7, 2005 with both parties pleading guilty. Lim served one day in jail and was fine S$5,000, while Koh was sentenced to one month of imprisonment.

The news caused a shockwave in the Singapore blogging community, with several prominent local bloggers questioning the seriousness of the charge, raising heated discussions of the freedom of speech and opinion on the Internet.

Singapore Angle, a local blog with several contributors, compiled a comprehensive report of the story, assimilating reactions from a number of bloggers.

With the government stepping in to police the Internet for possibly inflammatory remarks that ‘promote feelings of ill-will and hostility between different races or classes of the population of Singapore’ (Sedition Act, cited in Singasingapore 2005), clearer guidelines have to be drawn. A more discerning perspective must be taken in order to determine what is truly libel or slander, or simply just sheer ignorance.

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