Communications and Multimedia Minister Salleh Said Keruak described the foreign media reports on Malaysia as “very one-sided” and “not balanced”.

He said they gave the impression that everything about the government was bad while the political opposition were angels.

He also said that these reports on Malaysia and Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak had been recycled from those of years ago about corruption, fraudulent elections, lack of democracy, denial of freedom of speech, and so on. 

“Over the last two days, the foreign media has been attacking Malaysia in general and Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak in particular.

“This is not surprising considering that Mahathir Mohamad had said, ‘we are forced to use the foreign media channels; the BN (Barisan Nasional) can do so, they have a lot of money to hire analysts from Cambridge’,” he said in a post on his blog today.

Salleh, who is also the Umno treasurer, explained that from 30 years ago, when Mahathir was the prime minister, until today, the foreign media was still saying the same thing.

He said the opposition then viralled (circulated) these reports to give the impression that the whole world was against Malaysia.

“What the foreign media fails to mention in these reports is the many cases of corruption now being investigated by the MACC in the Pakatan Harapan states of Selangor and Penang ...

“… or about the allegations of cheating in 13th general election (in 2013), such as (the alleged bringing in of) 40,000 Bangladeshi voters, that were proven false,” he added.

- Bernama