2 Pakatan Mps Pour Cold Water On Call For Media Prima Rival

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Hassan Karim and Syahredzan Johan were responding to a suggestion made by Amanah leader Khalid Samad at the party’s national convention on Sunday.PETALING JAYA: Two Pakatan Harapan MPs have rejected a suggestion by Amanah communications director Khalid Samad for the coalition to set up a media company to rival Media Prima Bhd to counter “negative propaganda”.
PKR’s Hassan Karim said a PH-owned media company would be difficult to set up as the component parties had their own media strategies.
It would be better for the coalition to focus on capitalising on social media, especially Tik Tok, to reach voters, the Pasir Gudang MP said. He added that PH MPs just need to be more social media-savvy.
He also pointed out that PAS was able to increase its parliamentary seats despite not owning a media company, with the Islamic party relying solely on social media.
“We say they (PAS) appear to be old-fashioned, but they are actually (social media) savvy. Their IT skills are good.
“Even if you have mainstream media, regardless of its name, if the principles and policies are not accepted by the people, it will provide no return,” Hassan told FMT.
He added that despite Umno “controlling” Media Prima, it failed to garner support from the voters, which saw it suffer losses in the last two general elections as well as in the state polls last August
In a speech at the Amanah national convention on Sunday, Khalid said that PH needed a media company to communicate with the people more effectively.
He said he had suggested to the PH presidential council that the coalition establish a media company to rival Media Prima in order to “tackle negative propaganda” .
Meanwhile, DAP’s Syahredzan Johan said while Khalid’s idea could be explored, it was unrealistic to compete with the likes of Media Prima as its content was not solely focussed on getting the message across to the public, but also included entertainment.
Setting up a media company to rival Media Prima was “pointless”, the Bangi MP added.
Syahredzan, whose father is veteran journalist Johan Jaffar and a former chairman of Media Prima, said rather than having a media company, it would be better for PH to have a smaller outfit and focus on producing social media content for platforms such as TikTok and Instagram. - FMT

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