Oleh/By		:	DATO' SERI DR. MAHATHIR BIN MOHAMAD 
Tempat/Venue 	: 	FEDERAL HOTEL, KUALA LUMPUR 
Tarikh/Date 	: 	03/11/81 
Tajuk/Title  	: 	THE OPENING OF THE 5TH GENERAL 
			ASSEMBLY OF THE ORGANIZATION  OF 
			ASIAN NEWS AGENCIES (OANA) 




Saya mengambil peluang ini untuk mengucapkan terima kasih kepada Urusetia
Perhimpunan Agung OANA Yang Kelima yang telah menjemput dan memberi
penghormatan kepada saya untuk merasmikan Perhimpunan ini. Kepada para
peserta sekelian saya dengan segala sukacitanya mengucapkan selamat datang
ke Kuala Lumpur dan Malaysia dengan harapan semasa saudara-saudara berada
di sini saudara-saudara akan dapat melihat dengan lebih dekat lagi
masyarakat dan cara hidup di sini.

Ladies and Gentlemen, 2. Allow me first and foremost to thank the
Secretariat for giving me the honour to declare open this assembly. On
behalf of BERNAMA, Malaysia's NATIONAL News Agency, let me express my
gratitude to UNESCO and the Executive Board of the Organization of Asian
News Agencies for choosing Malaysia as the host country for this meeting.

3. If I may recall, this is the second large regional gathering of key
media and media related personnel to have been held in this country within
the past three years. The first was the Intergovernmental Conference on
Communication Policies in Asia and Oceania or ASIOCOM held in February,
1979.

4. I deliberately mentioned ASIOCOM not only because it is related to this
meeting but also because it was during that Conference that OANA formally
made an offer to provide the organizational framework for a news exchange
programme among Asian countries, a concept first mooted in a
UNESCO-sponsored meeting of experts in Colombo in 1976.

Although it is now almost five years since the idea was first mooted and
close to three years after it was given an official blessing in the form
of declarations and recommendations adopted at the ASIOCOM, we are yet to
see that concept translated into reality. Nevertheless, bearing in mind
the varied policies pursued by the various News Agencies now available in
Asia, I could not help but be sympathetic with all of you for the numerous
problems you have to overcome before taking substantive action on the
matter.

Ladies and Gentlemen.

5. The role of the mass media in national development as we are quite
aware, has been the underlying theme of numerous fora for many years. It
is a favourite research topic among social scientists. Various United
Nation Agencies too, including the UNESCO, has from time to time directed
their attention to this area of study.

6. Being experts in the field in your own right, I am sure you are very
familiar with the subject. It is not my intention, therefore, to dwell on
it at great length. A particular point that I wish to emphasise here is
what I consider as the lack of a sense of social responsibility on the
part of some media personnel. This lack of concern or absence of
responsibility on the part of some journalists is what brings you here
to-day.

7. We in Malaysia are particularly concerned with the frequent incidents
of misreporting, deliberate or otherwise, about our affairs in the foreign
press, especially Western Press. We had our first few bitter doses of
uncalled-for publicity shortly after the May 13, 1969 racial riots in
which foreign readers were regaled with distorted views of the events
happening then. Indeed dire predictions were made which imply that the
world could write off Malaysia. In the event Malaysia did not only get
over her difficulties, but she emerged stronger, more united and more
prosperous than ever before.

8. Nevertheless, the years following that unfortunate incident saw us
occasionally falling victim to the wild imaginations and
sensation-mindedness of some irresponsible journalists, some of whom had
not even visited our country.

Lately, as a result of our legitimate attempts to gain control of our own
resources, we have been subjected to various reports calculated to
frighten away foreign investors from our country. Against this campaign,
we are literally speaking, helpless. The newspapers of one western
country, particularly if English speaking, is enough to damage us in the
eyes of the world.

9. For those of you who have just arrived in this country you may notice
that Malaysia is not by any means the most modern country. Within the
capital, Kuala Lumpur, and in the rural areas, there are people living in
dilapidated huts.

Nevertheless, I am sure you would have noticed that we do not live on
trees. Imagine our mild surprise when a book widely distributed throughout
the world among children and adults described and illustrated how
Malaysians live on trees in order to escape wild animals. The only people
Malaysians would like to escape from are these kind of publishers. I am
sure that if the media as a whole is sensitive and cares for the truth, or
at least a modicum of that commodity, this kind of thing would not happen.

10. You too may have come across such rubbish. How do we overcome this
problem? The answer to a great extent lies with us. We should not allow
others to monopolise information about ourself. We should expand our
efforts at informing the world what is the truth about ourself and what is
fiction. Asians should not fall into the pattern of sensationalism and
unmitigated embellishment of the truth that characterise the western
press. We should tell things as they are. In time the world will learn
that we are reliable and our credibility will ensure our acceptance.

11. A trend that is to be applauded is investigative
reporting. Unfortunately, only a thin invisible line separates
investigative reporting from muck-raking. The world must have secrets
which should not be exposed if relationship between nations is to be
good. If every single thought about our friends are known to them, they
will not remain friends. So, while investigative reporting is good, we
should be careful not to allow such reports to degenerate into
muck-raking.

12. As it is now, we in the Third World countries have far too long been
suffering not only from the constant ill-treatment by the powerful Western
agencies but also from the insufficient space given to us by the western
newspapers as against what our media give them. This imbalanced pattern of
news flow, as you often call it, is very much of concern to us in this
country. Whatever the reasons for the current state of affairs, it is
evident that this problem of information imbalance between the developed
and developing countries can no longer be accepted by us in the Third
World.

13. At this juncture I would like to relate my latest experience with
those who govern media ethics. Recently an article on freedom of the press
by me was published in a local newspaper. Three days ago I received a
telegram from the International Press Institute which carried an implied
threat to the image of our country. Yet the same telegram pointed out that
the U.N. members had accepted human rights to include, "Freedom --- to
impart ideas of all kinds ---".

What I did was to impart my ideas through the media, an exercise of one of
the human rights to which I am as entitled as anyone else. It is strange
that an institute that is supposed to protect my right should seek to deny
it.

Yet when deliberate misreporting and agitations are carried out through
the press, no comment is heard.

14. I realise that international organisations like this are very
powerful. We have had several brushes with such organisations before and
have been badly bruised. But in the name of press freedom itself, I refuse
to be cowed by threats to our countries' image.

15. The Third World has suffered much from quote "the freedom to seek,
receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of
frontiers". While our frontiers have been breached again and again, we
have not had the same capacity with regard to the frontiers of the
countries which control world media. It is because the exercise of press
freedom is so loaded in favour of the developed countries that we have
tried to fight for a new world information and communication order. The
UNESCO is very well aware of this.

All the principles of the United Nations were written by developed
countries before the developing countries were admitted as members. Now
that the membership of the United Nations is greatly enlarged, some of the
loaded principles should be reviewed. The western controlled international
media have subverted the Governments of many developing countries until
some are overthrown. The sad thing is that the Governments which took over
are often less democratic than the maligned predecessor. Whatever
Governments take over, they soon become subjects of international
vilification by the western media.

16. While it is not my intention to interfere with your deliberations, I
strongly feel that the time has now come for the Asian news exchange
concept to be translated into reality as the first step towards the
establishment of a New World Information and Communication Order.

17. In this connection, I am glad to learn that the proposal will be one
of the main subjects for discussion at this assembly. This in itself has
made the Kuala Lumpur OANA General Assembly more important than your
previous assemblies. I am pleased to hear that this organization had for
the past few years been actively pursuing the matter in the hope that a
viable news exchange project could be launched as soon as possible. On its
own, it had even taken the move to amend its statutes to accomodate the
non-Asian news agencies to enable a wider participation in the proposed
project. I was also told that numerous follow-up meetings have been held
by several expert committees since the ASIOCOM Conference. It appears to
me that what is needed now is a greater will to make the project a
success.

18. The fact that more than twenty-three news agencies including those
from the non-OANA member Pacific countries are attending this assembly is
a clear manifestation of your seriousness of intention. In terms of
technical requirement, I was given to understand that there is now a
greatly felt need for the various telecommunication authorities to reduce
their tariff rates to enable a more viable news exchange programme among
the non profit-making news agencies of the region. It is my hope that this
repeated call be heeded for our own mutual benefit.

19. Malaysia for our part, have already reduced the rate
substantially. Although a substantial reduction of tariff rates would mean
a great loss of revenue to us, I for one would not mind it if it is in the
long term interest of the region and its peoples. It is with this same
spirit that I hope this move by us would be followed by the other
countries in the region. We believe that an efficient network of news
exchanges across Asia and the Pacific would not only facilitate the flow
of news between and within the developing countries of the region but also
from the region to the outside world bearing in mind the various
bi-lateral and multi-lateral exchange arrangements already in operation by
certain agencies.

20. It is my hope that the time would not be too long for us to see Asia's
image being painted by Asians themselves rather than by outsiders who are
neither sensitive to our needs and aspirations nor sympathetic to our
cause. A just and equitable distribution of information within the region
and outside it would inevitably help promote regional understanding and in
the long run enhance further the co-operative efforts among the countries
of the region.

Ladies and Gentlemen, 21. With this hope , I hereby declare this fifth
General Assembly of the Organization of Asian News Agencies opened.