PETALING JAYA, March 6 — The government has not reached a decision on a proposal to review the validity period of accreditation cards for the press, Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil said today amid some criticism that the move might stifle media organisations that are seen as critical of the establishment.
The Lembah Pantai MP claimed the proposal was a result of discussions he held with “several parties” that included the Foreign Correspondents Club (FCC).
The Information Department (Japen) eventually announced the proposal yesterday even as Fahmi and the department face mounting criticism over a slew of bureaucratic moves that have fuelled allegations of censorship.
“Before I launched the updated Journalism Code of Ethics, I heard views from several parties, one of them being the FCC, about the validity period (of the cards). As a consequence, I told Japen to review a few things,” he told reporters after launching a CelcomDigi product here.
“So I was made to understand Japen had issued a statement yesterday and I repeat again there are a few things that I asked them to review and they are being streamlined again. This is still under Japen consideration.”
Japen said yesterday that it is in the process of reviewing standard operating procedures (SOP) for issuing media cards, including the period of validity as part of a bid to “streamline” and reform media regulation.
Malaysiakini reported shortly after the announcement that Japen had quietly slashed the validity period of media cards issued to journalists working with online media this year.
Malaysiakini journalists were among those reported to have been issued cards with one-year validity while others, like journalists of news website Twentytwo13, received cards with just six-month validity, the news portal reported.
Fahmi is also facing mounting criticism about the updated “official” code of ethics of journalists.
Various independent groups alleged they were largely left out of the consultation process, which prompted claims that the process in formulating the updated code was undemocratic.
