Give Anwar exclusive airtime, supporters dare TV3

PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim’s supporters have handed over a memorandum challenging TV3 to give the opposition leader exclusive airtime over allegations of unfair reporting over his statement on Israel.

They claim that the owner of TV3 and several other media companies, Media Prima Bhd, had launched a “planned character assassination” against Anwar through its subsidiaries without giving him the space to defend himself.

“Anwar Ibrahim Club challenges Media Prima Bhd, especially via TV3’s newscast Buletin Utama, to allow Anwar to appear exclusively in the near future so that he would have a platform to respond to the recent one-sided attacks against him,” said club president Saifuddin Shafi Muhammad in the memorandum.

The memorandum was addressed to Media Prima’s board of directors chairperson Johan Jaafar, and was taken to Sri Pentas, Selangor where the headquarters of Media Prima and TV3 is located.

The delegation of four was met by the company’s corporate communications group general manager, Mastura Adnan, who accepted the memorandum.

When asked why Media Prima was singled out, Saifuddin said, “For now, we see that Media Prima, especially TV3′s Buletin Utama, had been relentlessly attacking Anwar.

“We consider them giants in the journalism and publishing industries. They should set an example with better and more transparent reporting because they are watched by millions of Malaysians.”

Anwar had been taking flak after he reportedly told the Asian Wall Street Journal that he supported “all efforts to protect the security of the state of Israel.”

He later explained that his full statement continues, “… a step which remains contingent on Israel respecting the aspirations of Palestinians.”

Malaysiakini