At a media interview in Malaysia yesterday (July 19), Singapore’s state media ChannelNewsAsia (CNA) was caught for fabricating fake news by Malaysia’s Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.
CNA reporter: “There has been reports saying that Jho Low is currently in China, are you aware?”
To which, Mahathir Mohamad rolled his eyes and responded:
“You are better informed than the Prime Minister.”
Alongside national newspaper Straits Times and television broadcaster Mediacorp, Singapore’s state media is collectively ranked 153rd in the world for credibility in 2018.
Since the election of the new Malaysian government, Singapore state media has been repeatedly churning out fake news to undermine the incumbent in an attempt to bring back the corrupted Najib Razak government. Earlier in May this year, Singapore’s Straits Times wrote a fake news claiming that serious infighting broke out in the new Malaysian government.
Fake news laws do not apply for the state media, as the government abuses the law to censor independent journalism and its critics.
The Singapore government, through a Select Committee, recently conducted a “public hearing” claiming to consult the public for new censorship laws. The Select Committee on Deliberate Online Falsehoods was met with strong opposition from international media companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter. The government committee then censored and even posted inaccurate summaries of the public hearings.