UMNO Reform: Does the New Straits Times Herald Change?
Yesterday, the New Straits Times accomplished a most unlikely feat: publishing an editorial worth reading. Malaysian newspapers have never managed to produce very readable editorials; the typical Malaysian editorial is made up of one part bland inanities, one part specious rhetoric, combined with a pinch of pointlessness. Even The Sun, one of the better newspapers, has never in my memory carried an editorial worth the time it took me to read it. The New Straits Times bucked the trend, however, and maybe — just maybe — it is a sign of better things to come. First, a brief background. The New Straits Times is published by the New Straits Times Press (NSTP); the NSTP itself is owned by Media Prima, which has a virtual monopoly on much of the Malaysian media (you name a medium, they’ve swamped the market — perhaps the internet excepted). Media Prima, of course, is owned by UMNO. There is more to this than that, of course. UMNO is not a homogeneous entity; from time to time, it has been wra
