Comments on: Malaysia To Bloggers: Forget The Past, Let’s Be Friends https://www.blogherald.com/general/malaysia-to-bloggers-forget-the-past-lets-be-friends/ The leading source of news covering social media and the blogosphere. Wed, 26 Mar 2008 03:59:26 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.9.9 By: Darnell Clayton https://www.blogherald.com/general/malaysia-to-bloggers-forget-the-past-lets-be-friends/#comment-371881 Wed, 26 Mar 2008 03:59:26 +0000 http://www.blogherald.com/2008/03/25/malaysia-to-bloggers-forget-the-past-lets-be-friends/#comment-371881 Hey Pablopabla,

Thanks for dropping by! I had a feeling the “relationship” between the government and the Malaysian blogosphere was tense, but I just didn’t know how tense!

I guess if my own government provided a similar offer (and my relationship with them would probably be considered “friendly” compared to what you’re going through) I would probably also be suspicious.

Anyways, keep us informed about what is happening over there…and congrats on the victories during the elections.

]]> By: pablopabla https://www.blogherald.com/general/malaysia-to-bloggers-forget-the-past-lets-be-friends/#comment-371879 Wed, 26 Mar 2008 03:49:05 +0000 http://www.blogherald.com/2008/03/25/malaysia-to-bloggers-forget-the-past-lets-be-friends/#comment-371879 The recently concluded General Elections in Malaysia has dealt a heavy blow to the Barisan Nasional coalition government. For the first time in 50 years (they have been in power since independance), they have lost 2/3 majority in Parliament and 5 states fell to opposition parties.

Pre-election, the opposition parties faced a daunting task trying to reach out to the electorate as the government controlled the mass media. The opposition parties started airing their viewpoints and criticisms using websites and blogs . Many ordinary bloggers also joined the fray when they realised that the Malaysian public has been duped by the government all these years with their propaganda.

The criticisms were so hotly felt that the past Information Minister labelled bloggers as “goblok” (an Indonesian slang for the word “Stupid”). Many other Ministers also ridiculed bloggers with names and called on the public to ignore bloggers. Some even suggested that the internet media is full of lies, sensationalism and cannot be trusted at all compared to newspaper and television reports.

Well, that past Information Minister lost in the elections and many others. Many say that the internet media (and bloggers especially) helped to create a political tsunami which saw the Barisan Nasional coalition government losing badly.

At long last, the Prime Minister now concedes that they have taken bloggers too lightly and had dismissed their influence. Now they want to engage with bloggers.

Most Malaysian bloggers (me included if you consider that I do blog about political stuffs in my personal blog) think that this is another attempt by the government to identify bloggers and clamp down on them (which they tried to do so earlier by suggesting that bloggers need to be registered). The battle continues.

This is a long comment but please forgive my indulgence as I want to share how the Malaysian bloggers’ have actually influenced the outcome of a General Election to such an extent that the Prime Minister made a public statement about it.

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