COMMENT | We at the Centre for the Study of Communications and Culture (CSCC) write to express our concern at the recent `revelations’ by Gobind Singh Deo in his capacity as the minister for communications and multimedia.

We have no objection to his wanting to get rid of the odious, the repugnant Anti-Fake News Act (2018), a law that has no place in a democracy.

Equally, we would welcome any serious attempts on his part to critically study, amend, even repeal, other laws, such as the Printing Presses and Publications Act (1984/87) and the Communications and Multimedia Act.

But we wish to assert that legalistic measures alone are not sufficient to reform institutions that have long existed without a coherent vision for the rakyat (and, as we shall argue, by the rakyat), despite being funded primarily by Malaysian taxpayers.

While liberating legal frameworks are important, we all need to understand that the media – in this case, public media – produce unique products. They are economic products, like canned sardines, to be sold to the public.

Yet, media products - news, current affairs programmes, fictional TV like soap operas, films, documentaries – are also cultural products. They contain meanings, ideas, ideologies and are pivotal in defining social consciousness in this digital world...