Singapore : “the most open and clear society in the world”

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An Opinion Piece ........................

If Singapore is Rupert Murdoch’s Idea Of ‘Open and Clear,’ That Explains a Lot
John Berthelsen
John Berthelsen is editor of Asia Sentinel.
July 23, 2011


Rupert Murdoch and his son James voiced their regret over the phone hacking scandal to MPs

Probably the most telling statement the press baron Rupert Murdoch made during his abject mea culpa before the British Parliament this week was his praise of Singapore, calling it “the most open and clear society in the world” and “the cleanest society you can find anywhere — as every minister is paid at least one million dollars a year and has no temptation to transgress.”

What that statement betrays is that Rupert Murdoch appears to have no basic appreciation of independent journalism or democracy itself.

Transparency International’s Corruption Index ties Denmark and New Zealand with Singapore at the very top of its corruption perceptions index. Leave aside the question of what the lawmakers of Denmark and Sweden are paid to maintain their integrity — a fraction of what Singapore ministers get.

What keeps Singapore’s ministers in line is not those million-dollar paychecks but the fact that they are scared to death of Lee Kuan Yew, who has shown no compunction whatsoever in jailing the odd minister who does stick his hand in somebody else’s pockets. In 1986, Teh Cheang Wan, one of Lee’s best friends, a co-founder of the state and the head of the national development ministry, committed suicide rather than face corruption charges that Lee was intent on bringing against him.

The leader of the world’s most powerful news organization, who ought to believe in an independent and free press, was praising a country that most recently jailed the author Alan Shadrake for pointing out that Singapore’s criminal justice system skews toward hanging the poor and excusing the wealthy and expatriates. Singapore has the world’s highest per-capita rate of executions.

It seems odd that Murdoch didn’t notice that Reporters Without Borders ranks Singapore at 140th of 167 countries in terms of press freedom, or that Time Magazine, Asiaweek, the Financial Times, the International Herald Tribune, The Economist, Bloomberg News Service and other publications have been cowed into submission through libel suits, contempt of court action and gazetting to limit their circulation. It is especially odd that Murdoch owned two of them — the Far Eastern Economic Review, before it closed, and the Wall Street Journal Asia. Those that haven’t been sued or otherwise attacked have learned the lesson and simply don’t report critically on the country.

The country’s own media dare not report what happens in Singapore beyond what the leaders want to see in print. And what has happened, considering the practice of democracy and free elections, is nothing short of appalling.

According a chronology compiled by the Web site New Asia Republic, since 1994, in addition to suing newspapers on the thinnest of pretexts and winning all of its cases in its own courts, police have raided private homes and arrested members of churches it doesn’t like.

Former Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong once threatened to turn constituencies into slums if they didn’t vote for the ruling People’s Action Party. Both opposition leaders Chee Soon Juan and the late JB Jeyaretnam have been sued, charged with perjury and defamation and hounded with a variety of other charges in an effort to drive them out of politics. Opposition leaders’ homes and offices have been stormed by Inland Revenue officials who carted away tons of documents to seek to make cases for tax evasion.

According to the US State Department’s human rights report on Singapore, it is “widely believed that the authorities routinely conduct surveillance on some opposition politicians and other critics of the government.” The same report also states that the Internal Security Department is believed to run a network of part-time informants in the United States, Australia and other countries.

Political films and videos have been banned. Foreign television stations and networks have been asked to restrict coverage of small political parties and warned against critical reporting of the country. The police have been given lawful access to data and encrypted material. CD-ROMs have been added to the Undesirable Publications Act.

In 1999, the Home Affairs Ministry admitted that it had secretly scanned the computers of more than 200,000 Internet users. Even women’s magazines have been warned not to get involved in partisan matters. Public rallies by the opposition have been banned repeatedly. Members of the Falun Gong sect have been arrested.

In 2001, Parliament passed a law that allows punishment of foreign news broadcasters who are “engaging in the domestic politics of Singapore.” Online campaigns have been restricted. Police have raided Internet critics’ homes and confiscated their computers. In 2002, the supposedly independent courts ruled that there would be no trial for defamation suits brought by Goh Chok Tong and Lee Kuan Yew against opposition leader Chee Soon Juan. He was found guilty by summary judgment.

Nor does Murdoch appear to have noticed that Singapore, this paragon of integrity, is home to vast amounts of the stolen wealth of Burma and Indonesia. Some 18,000 Indonesians described as “rich” were living in Singapore in 2007, according to Tempo Magazine, worth a combined total of $86 billion. A good $13.5 billion of that was looted from the Indonesian central bank’s recapitalization lifeline to 48 ailing banks during the 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis.

Burma’s generals, who have beggared their country and savagely repressed their citizenry, are believed to have transferred nearly $5 billion into two Singapore banks from the sale of gas since 2000, according to Earth Rights International. One of their generals has even had a rose named after him in the Singapore Botanical Gardens.

Aside from whether the old lizard was crying crocodile tears in his testimony when he said he and his top executives knew nothing of his employees hacking into hundreds of voicemails up to and including the royal family, Murdoch’s apparent admiration of Singapore speaks volumes about his own corporate empire.

If this is what he believes about the foundations of democracy — that mere money will bribe politicians to stay out of trouble — then there are few moral imperatives that guide his stewardship of the press. It is okay for Fox News in the United States to hire Republican presidential candidates and give them a nationwide forum while — in Fox’s famous slogan — they report, the viewers decide. It is okay for a putatively neutral news organization to virtually dictate through its media outlets who will be in power in the UK.

It would be inimical — unthinkable — for any government to order the divestment of any enterprise having to do with a free press, no matter how odious, and a lot of Murdoch’s various media enterprises are odious in that they have interfered with the free and fair operation of democracy in at least three countries by scandalous and biased reporting designed to further his business interests. But maybe it is time for the heretofore toothless board of directors of News International to take a look at where he has got them. That is what boards of directors are for.

thejakartaglobe.com

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so is Rupert takin the piss or is he really dumb ?

[Butterfly]

^ no, he is a simply a Right Wing Authoritarian, also known as Fascist

he is quite mainstream in the US, full of nutters like him

[Mr Lick]

Well lets assume also from his claim that, whilst being the head of an International news corporation, he was unaware of the source of information that was making front page headlines and earning his company a great deal of cash for a considerable period, that he may indeed have taken the piss on more than one occasion.