Talking about press freedom – with P. N. Balji

[Confuseous]

The enigma has always been, how is it that newspapers that are not government owned – and it is a common myth that they are government owned, when the number one shareholder of SPH shares is Citibank followed by HSBC – have been subject to such enduring press controls. I emphasise enduring, because of course it doesn't take much brains to control anything for a day or a week or a month. But how is it possible for a group of men to have controlled the ideological space for decades with no sign of any erosion of its ability to control that space?

The PAP has been able to preserve its dominance – which may be fraying at the edges, but by and large preserve its dominance – with diminishing use of power. It is not difficult to preserve dominance if you are willing to ratchet up your abuses every year, applying more and more violence. The mystery in Singapore is that the dominance remains, but the violence has reduced. Which must mean that in place of violence – in place of locking up journalists under the ISA, in place of closing down newspapers – somehow they’ve managed to preserve their dominance in less violent ways. So what are these less violent ways? That’s what my book tries to answer.

- http://journalism.sg/2012/11/14/talking-about-press-freedom-with-p-n-balji/

 

[Clone]

And who are the main management shareholders?

Points for TS. Good one!