OF late there has been considerable foreign media interest in Malaysia. We do not deny that Malaysia is a very storied land. To add to this the dubious and untrue narratives is an unwelcome habit of the pen.
The reasons for this can be guessed at. But that is to enter a world of speculation, a business model that isn't ours. We leave the reasons to the foreign media to explain.
In the meantime, two of the foreign news reports need some explanation. One is the claim that a casino is being proposed for Forest City, a mega-project in Johor built on reclaimed land by China developer Country Garden, and the other is the so-called plan by the government to cut fuel subsidies by next month.
Start with the casino claim reported by a foreign news agency citing unnamed sources. It is not unusual for the media, foreign or local, to do so but the onus is on them to ensure that the sources are trustworthy.
As far as the claim is concerned, it has been denied out of existence from the prime minister downwards. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who is named in the news report as having met two Malaysian tycoons to discuss a plan to open a casino in Forest City, has called it a lie.
The tycoons, also named in the report, have denied having had any meeting on the casino project. Johor Menteri Besar Datuk Onn Hafiz Ghazi, too, dismissed the casino claim as an act of sabotage in a statement on April 26. No casino will be opened or operated in the state, he said. One can't be more definite than that.
Now for the fuel subsidy cut by next month as speculated by several foreign news portals. One even ventured into specifics quoting "official and industry sources". Diesel prices would be floated to market rates in a matter of weeks after the Kuala Kubu Baharu by-election on May 11, followed by a staggered rise in retail rates of petrol.
It didn't end there. The news portal and others followed it with the projected hike adding to Malaysian cost woes. The World Bank and local economists joined in to add their menu to the brew.
Anwar said there has been no firm decision by the cabinet on the price hike for diesel and petrol, and to report it as such is premature and unethical. He is right. Discussion isn't equal to decision. The news portals would have done better if they reported the proposed subsidy cut as being under discussion.
Perhaps the sources didn't make it clear. Made-up stories have a history. It all began in August 1835 with The New York Sun's "Great Moon Hoax", when it purportedly quoted British astronomer of great repute, John Herschel, as saying that the moon was teeming with man-bats.
Sure, Herschel was in an observatory in South Africa on a moon mission. The New York Sun's readers knew this, but what they didn't was the fact that he was months' away from any communication with its editor, Richard Adams Locke — whose mind appeared set on doubling the paper's circulation from 8,000 copies.
Taking advantage of this, Locke concocted the man-bats story, arguably the world's first fake news. The rest is history repeating itself.
