There is an anecdote in business history to which many students of management must have come across. It involves Henry Ford, the man who first used the assembly line technique in mass producing his model-T cars. It transpired that he produced these cars only in one colour, black.

Apparently one customer (presumably) did not quite appreciate the monotony of this one singular colour. He must have found it boring. So he came with the inquiry could Henry Ford produce cars in other colours like pink, white, green or purple perhaps?

The industrialist took note of the comment. But as the virtual inventor of the assembly line and mass production, he must have had his own arguments for producing his cars only in one colour, like economies of scale, volume, and optimum prices.

So he replied ‘Yes of course I can produce cars in many colours - so long as they are black'. In other words, nothing doing you idiot, black it is and black it shall be.

Back to our blessed country. Najib the newly ascended prime minister has made the following impassioned statement:

‘If we are truly to build a democracy that is responsive to the needs of all the people, we need a media - both old and new - that is empowered to responsibly report what they see, without fear of consequence'.

In a reverse analogous way, Najib's statement is much like Henry Ford's customer. Are we going to enjoy the freedom of speech and expression? Is government intimidation of people going to end? Are suppressive and oppressive laws like the ISA, OSA, and the Sedition Act going to be repealed?

We Malaysians should not accept Najib's statement too easily, no matter how sincerely he might have meant it to be. The crux of the matter is that he has been at the highest level of government leadership for a very long time, and had all the opportunity to ‘truly build a democracy... responsive to the needs of the people'.

The point is he did not do much, not along this line anyway.

In any case sincerity is subject to test.

A test has come, in the form of an event or non-event, depending on how one takes the case. About 10 of the Terengganu state legislative assembly members were conducting a conspicuous absence from a meeting of the legislature. This shut out or walk out, or whatever label we could use to describe it was reported - and why not - by most TV stations, save RTM.

Now RTM is our Pravda, the dutiful and loyal Russian government's news agency. RTM is equally dutiful and loyal to the government. It is the de facto voice of the government. So when it elects not to air this particular news, then surely this is a smear to Najib's pronouncements.

And in comes Rais Yatim, the new information czar. In this capacity Rais is analogous to Henry Ford, for he determines what news to reveal and share with the people, and how whatever is revealed is to be doctored to suit the ruling elite's agenda.

In this case, there is this report Rais denies RTM blackout , and I quote:

‘And the government has the right to publish any news they wish to highlight,' he reportedly said.'

Rais went on to say that censorship exists everywhere, with the connotation that this being so, there is nothing wrong with the country's prevailing censorship regime. This is a most contentious statement and I'd delve into it only briefly here.

Of course there is ‘censorship' everywhere for editors have to sieve through a lot of garbage and noise before putting up a story for printing. But could Rais confuse between censorship and editing?

In any case, if we care to ponder by just a little, we can see that Rais' statement is already in conflict with Najib's. All our cars must come in black you idiot, and expressions must be geared to suit government needs. In short, we are not moving any inch further than before. This is sad.

Sadder still is that Najib is the boss to Rais. Najib thus far has not refuted Rais' statement and take him to task for insubordination or for ‘confusing the people', the term often used when the government has no other solid answer.

Najib, please make a stand, so that we the people can be that much less confused. Otherwise, where to, Malaysia?