Harakah , the party organ of PAS, refused to apologise for the allegation it made relating to the controversial "two Mahathirs" photo. The tabloid press had accused Berita Minggu (the Sunday edition of top-selling Malay newspaper Berita Harian ) for publishing a "doctored" photo on Nov 28. Yesterday, Malaysia's news agency Bernama , the supplier of the photo, strongly denied the charge. [See [#1]Photos[/#]

]

The contentious photo depicts Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad surrounded by a crowd at a meet-the-people function in Kangar, Perlis. Harakah had in its Dec 6 issue questioned the size of the crowd which welcomed Mahathir and pointed out that Berita Minggu had doctored the original photo to show a much larger reception.

It also claimed that there were in fact two Mahathirs in the same photo, raising the possibility that photos of two separate functions had been spliced together.

Abd Rahman Koya, Harakah English section editor, told Malaysiakini that the paper would not apologise. Instead, Harakah would explain its allegation to its readers in coming editions. "The major question is that the two crowds look like they are at two different functions," he said.

Berita Minggu and New Straits Times had this week responded to the charges by publishing a close-up photo to show that the person behind Mahathir was not "another Mahathir" as claimed by Harakah .

"But who is the individual in that photo?" asked Rahman .

"I have asked the opinions of our technical experts and as well as others. They said the photo had been doctored to make it look like there was an overwhelming response from the people when the Prime Minister attended the function," he said.

Rahman added that Bernama had been careless when it "doctored" the photo. The photo appeared awkward, he said. The readers, he said, would decide for themselves about the authenticity of the photo. [See [#2] Experts: Photo 'doctored'[/#]

]

The photographer of the controversial photo, Mansor Bahrom from Bernama, insisted that the published photo was genuine and not doctored.

"I took the photo from a higher ground. However, it looked like there are two different leaders: Dr. Mahathir in front and another unknown one, both meeting the people."

Mansor said that the photo was taken during a "Leader and Peoples' Assembly", which was held in an open field near Kangar Town Hall on Nov 27. [See [#3]Harakah has no brains, says Berita Minggu editor"[/#]

]

The controversy over the "Two Mahathirs" photo followed hot in the heels of the doctored photo which appeared in Chinese newspaper Sin Chew Jit Poh on Nov 14.

Editor-in-chief Liew Chen Chuan apologised for altering the image of a photo in which the image of sacked Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim was replaced with that of current Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

The original photo, taken at the launch of the BN election manifesto in 1995, shows Anwar standing beside caretaker Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad along with key leaders of the BN coalition. However, Sin Chew Jit Poh had crudely swapped the image of Anwar with that of Abdullah in the photo. [[#4]See photo[/#]]