Last month, Off The Edge ran a cover story on ex-deputy premier Anwar Ibrahim, but some readers found the pages containing the interview 'missing' from the monthly lifestyle magazine's July issue.

Apparently someone had surreptitiously remove the six pages of the Anwar interview from the 72-page lifestyle magazine.

Off The Edge's editor Jason Tan is completely baffled by the act of "vandalism" against his publication.

He said he received a couple of complaints about the missing pages from readers who had bought the magazine. They were bought in two separate areas - one from a bookstore and another from a newsstand.

"What was done to the magazine was serious but we don't know the extent of this act," said Tan when contacted by malaysiakini this afternoon.

He said although a check later found out many of its copies remain intact, it was the first time the magazine encounter such vandalism since its launch in December 2004.

"We don't know whether it was done systematically (by certain unknown individuals), or by readers who wanted to read the interview but don't want to purchase a copy, or readers who were upset with what Anwar had said," added Tan.

He also attributed another possibility - that the news agents had took it upon themselves to 'censor' the magazine.

Asked whether Off The Edge had faced any pressure from the authorities, he replied: "I am not aware of any pressure officially from the Internal Security Ministry (which oversees censorship of publications)."

Spoke against the NEP

Tan, in an editor's note in the magazine's August issue, requested readers who had purchased copies which had missing pages of the Anwar interview to report this to the magazine so that he could get to the bottom of the matter.

He wrote in the note: "Given the recent opening up of public space in the media, the vandalism of reading material by various means in only to be expected from those unused or unwilling to expose themselves to contrarian views - or to avail themselves of avenues for dialogue."

According to Tan, the in-depth discussion on the New Economic Agenda (NEA) mooted by Anwar in the interview could have ruffled the feathers of certain individuals.

The ex-deputy premier, now adviser to the opposition Parti Keadilan Rakyat, spoke at length about his economic agenda in the six-page interview.

Anwar, once an advocate of the New Economic Policy (NEP), has called for its abolishment to be replaced with NEA, a non-racial based affirmative policy action.

He also lamented over the "complete media blackout" of his NEA proposal. Other issues he touched on in the interview included the recent religious controversy and the Ninth Malaysian Plan.

Anwar gave his first interview to Off The Edge in January 2005 - four months after he was freed following his court victory in overturning a sodomy conviction.

Off The Edge , a magazine published under The Edge Communications Sdn Bhd, has a circulation of about 8,000. It was initially known as Option 2, a pullout of the financial weekly The Edge .