Singapore
Oh, for a Bagful of New Dailies!
My wish for 2004: a real choice of newspapers to choose along with my breakfast. By Seah Chiang Nee, Edge Singapore.
Dec 29, 2003

Some 20 years ago, a senior government official told me something that rankled. "Singapore is a small place," he said. "How different can you be from The Straits Times?"

I was editor of the Singapore Monitor, an afternoon newspaper that applied without success to be allowed to go morning to compete head-on with The Straits Times.

The official was trying to explain the government's stand on media diversity: It wasn't feasible because the local news flow just wasn't enough to allow two rival papers to be different.

I disagreed, of course, but had to concede that he was not entirely wrong, given the Singapore of the time.

Affluent and tightly regulated, Singapore news-wise was often as quiet as Vientiane. Too many stories were at the time branded sensitive, including AIDS.

Singapore was just one big economic story and politics happened here only on once every five years.

I hate to admit it, but frankly in our office, the daily editorial meetings were often a snore - a seminar here, a press conference there; 80% to 90% of the day's news files jumped straight out of the news desk diary, not the sort that made readers rush to buy a newspaper.

There weren't many unscheduled newsbreaks like a bank robbery, a lightning strike or a street demonstration that routinely happened elsewhere in Asia.

Indeed, by about 4pm, we all knew what the next day's newspaper would look like.

That was, of course, the Old World.

Things began to change dramatically in Singapore in the Nineties - new technologies, China's growth, corporate and economic restructuring and even loss of jobs - all enough to knock the country's once safe cocoon into orbit.

Adding to this was a new generation - more educated, more demanding, more exposed to the larger world and with more diverse viewpoints.

It got worse with the arrival of Osama bin Laden, the Jemaah Islamiah and SARS: All sorts of policies began changing so quickly that many citizens were unable to keep up with them.

Today, you can have two or three competing newspapers all looking different from one another, if they're allowed to run on their own.

In an active file, no two papers are alike. Each has its own identity and its own characteristics.

Local journalists today are far better educated, trained and indeed responsible enough to provide a balanced and diverse coverage.

That's important for Singaporeans. To survive in an uncertain and challenging global economic climate, they need to be well informed so that they can pick the right options in life.

That requires informative newspapers with articulate, knowledgeable journalists, something that a monopoly simply cannot provide.

So, far this reason alone, I have a simple wish this Christmas: I'd like the chance to choose from more than one newspaper to go with my breakfast - the same way that I can choose my toothpaste.

Funny request? No, not after Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew's comment that Singapore may be too small for two TV networks. Right now, I can choose either The Straits Times or Today, the MediaCorp newspaper.

Of course, there are a number of other publications within SPH's own fold but they don't compete for the same readers.

I just hope no paper gets closed. Today's existence may not be much and it spices up the lives of Singaporeans.

And more than the government cares to admit it, it also contributes to Singapore's ambition to become an exciting global city like New York, London, Hong Kong or Tokyo.

Giving tabloids away to train commuters is a western practice that we've adopted but they are generally considered a fun read as opposed to the serious newspapers they complement in the marketplace.

There is a reason for it: Their priority is advertisers, advertisers and then readers - in that order.

The current Streats-Today face-off is more an advertising war than a journalistic one fought over scoops, exclusive or reasoned writing. It is actually a business fight, whose outcome has no impact on readers.

The existence of three mass-circulation papers (The Straits Times: 391,000 copies; Today: 300,000 and Streats: 280,000) chasing after a weak advertising dollar is shaking up everybody's bottom line, especially the SPH group.

For The Straits Times, its new child, Streats, is an unwanted baby that will immediately disappear the moment Today closes.

It was created only to counter Today's business incursion but is now actually cannibalising its own revenues.

The ad rates for the two tabloids are lower than those charged by The Straits Times, so they are luring revenue away from it.

The revenue that Streats (and, indeed, Today) rakes in comes straight from the flagship paper, transferring - from the SPH's point of view - from a higher to a lower value-added medium.

The Straits Times' only consolation is that it is better to lose revenue to Streats than to its rival, Today.

This has prompted a Streats staffer to observe: "Our fight is really not with Today's journalists. It's with our own salesmen who'd rather have customers advertising in ST than in Streats."

So fundamentally, competition is not going well for SPH. For Today, it's no bed of roses, either.

It is greatly outgunned by the vast network of SPH's resources (nine newspapers with over a thousand journalists) and will find it tough to be able to break out and take on The Straits Times in the morning market anytime soon.

For now, it seems it will be a long time before I get my wish for a multitude of new newspapers in Singapore, and even then it won't be numbers that matter.

Before he jumps down my chimney, I want to tell Mr. Claus that I'd be very disappointed with his bagful of new newspapers if they are mere replicas of one another - comments disallowed in their reports, all reading like the New Light of Myanmar. ENDS.

(Copyright: The Edge Singapore. First published in its latest Dec 29-Jan 11, edition)