edited by Alastair Carthew and Simon Winkelmann
Brunei’s first, historic blogger and twitter gathering; the death of a veteran and respected journalist, a media “appreciation night” and the continued tight control over all media by the authorities were features of Brunei’s media in 2011.The blogger and Twitter event in November brought forward the “faces behind the screens.” Some 80 people attended the half day event. A hash tag was created by the organisers to allow tweets to share updates and quotes.
Subjects covered included the number of hits bloggers receive and what news attracted more hits than others. Another was a case study of a blogger outside of Brunei who converted to Twitter to build a constituency. Also in November a “media appreciation night” was held in Gadong. It was essentially a party night, but brought together many elements of the local media.
The death of veteran Brunei journalist Ignatius Stephen in June from serious head injuries sustained in a fall was also widely reported. He was 75. Stephen worked for the state owned Borneo Bulletin for almost half a century, contributing significant news stories and features. One scoop he became famous for was his reporting of an abortive rebellion in the early sixties.
Despite roughly 50 percent of Brunei’s population having access to the Internet, the Sultanate still maintains restrictive media laws. In May, the 2005 Sedition Act was further amended to expand the list of punishable offenses to include criticism of the sultan, the royal family or the prominence of the national philosophy, known as the Malay Islamic monarchy concept. Harsh punishments were installed.
No incidents of attacks or harassment of journalists have been reported in Brunei in recent years, but the government has, from time-to-time warned the media not to take chances when reporting on the sultanate. The Borneo Bulletin is the main newspaper and is controlled by the sultan’s family. The Brunei Times is a second English language daily run by private business men.
A smaller Malay language newspaper and several Chinese language newspapers are also published within Brunei. Foreign newspapers are available but require prior government approval before distribution. The only television station, Radio Television Brunei, is state controlled but there is access to Malaysian broadcasts and satellite channels.
Brunei had 318,000 Internet users at March, 2011 and 214,000 Facebook subscribers. It was 142nd on the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index 2010.