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Wednesday, September 19, 2012

MORE LIES? Another Bernama pic of Najib said to be 'doctored'


A Bernama picture showing prime minister Najib Razak greeting UMNO members in his constituency of Pekan, Pahang is the latest to be disputed for its authenticity, after a blog claimed that it had been doctored.
Popular pro-Pakatan Rakyat blog Milo Suam had earlier pointed out inconsistencies in the photo published by the online edition of UMNO's mouthpiece New Straits Times. It shows Najib being greeted by a huge crowd at Dewan Konvensyen Sultan Ahmad Shah, where the Pekan UMNO's division meeting was held.
In its earlier posting, the blog circled several parts on the image to show how images of the people in the crowd are repeated, in an apparent attempt by the daily to make the crowd look mammoth.
Hours later, the blog claimed the picture had been removed.
"But they [NST] forgot to remove the edited image which has been uploaded on their remote server hosting its website," a posting said, with a link to lead readers to the picture.
A check by Harakahdaily however shows that the news story under the heading "Najib: United front crucial for Umno's success in polls" is still online, accompanied by the contentious image, only this time, the words "Bernama pic" have been added to its caption.
Not the first time: Fake crowds
This is not the first time that the government-controlled national news agency has been accused of doctoring photographs of government leaders greeting the public.
Earlier this month, Bernama's editor-in-chief Yong Soo Heong strongly denied that it “doctored” a picture taken at the Hari Raya open house hosted by Najib.
“Time is of the essence for a professional and responsible news organisation like Bernama and we do not have the time to indulge in irrational endeavours,” Yong said, while defending Najib as a "crowd puller".
The allegations bring to mind another incident in 1999, when Harakah questioned Bernama's photograph showing then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad being greeted by a large crowd in Kangar, Perlis, published by NSTP-owned Berita Minggu on November 28, 1999. While Harakah had claimed that the image was doctored to boost the crowd size, Bernama and other pro-government editors had defended the picture as genuine.
But 'picture-doctoring' is not always to boost the government's image, as in the case involving PKR's Batu member of parliament Tian Chua, who posted a fake photograph showing Najib, his former aide Abdul Razak Baginda and murdered Mongolian citizen Altantuya Shaariibuu together having dinner, purportedly in Paris.
Same practice in disgraced regimes
Beyond Malaysia, the practice of doctoring pictures has characterized news reporting under authoritarian regimes.
In September 2010, Egypt's state-owned daily Al-Ahram was caught in a controversy following a blogger's revelation that it doctored an image of then president Hosni Mubarak. The original picture had shown Mubarak with Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu and PLO's Mahmoud Abbas, trailing behind US president Barack Obama on the red carpet at the White House.
However, when Al-Ahram published the photo , Mubarak's position was switched to the front of the procession, to show him leading the other leaders.
-Harakahdaily

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