Diplomacy in Reporting: The Sulu Conflict in East Borneo

Abstract

There is a continuous diplomatic cooperation between Malaysia and Philippines especially in relation to its involvement in a regional group called ASEAN. Nevertheless, there exist tensions and conflict with the emergence of a secessionist movement among the Philippines minority who insist on claiming territorial rights of Sabah. The February 2013 insurgency at Kampung Tanduo, Lahat Datu caused a conflict and triggered a bloody battle. Using in-depth interviews, document analysis and secondary data, this study explores the intensity in which journalists, Malaysian and Philippines were positioned in discovering the problems and challenged faced in gathering and reporting information as well as the decisions made during this time. It was found that the most critical aspect of decision making derives from professional ethics which govern the individuals. It is clear that the crime reporters' loyalties lie not just to the profession but also to the people who employ them. The study has also successfully provided information which could be a source of reference for media practitioners and academicians and gives understanding not just the decision making of the reporter but the function and ethical aspects of reporting in a sensational field like conflict and war zones. This study can serve as a model for evaluation when implementing policies and training and the findings can be used by advisory committees especially in addressing issues of journalists reporting on national security.

Political Communication of Ahok in Demolishing Slums to Normalise River Ciliwung in Jakarta

“…According to Ross (1993), conflict management is a step taken by agents or third parties to direct a dispute towards achieving certain results that may or may not produce tranquility, positive thing, creativity, agreement or aggressiveness. This is in line with the results of a research conducted by Wilson and Ibrahim (2018) that the Philippines has proposed various options to create peace in Sulu, East Borneo in which the only way to rescue lives is agreeing to ceasefire and producing win-win solution.…”

Bridging the Gap: Exploring Police-Media Relations in Malaysia

“…The subtlety of the information from the crime reporters is revealing in itself as to the fact that the police certainly have some amount of control on who should speak to the media, how much can be said and which media should be given the "privilege" of information. This reasoning is logical, especially given evidence from previous research regarding the police control over the nature of crime reports (Altheide, 1985;Crandon & Dunne, 1997;Ericson, Baranek & Chan, 1989;Lovell, 2002;Wilson & Ibrahim, 2018). Based on the current study, the ability of the police to influence the information presented in the news varies by the type of stories covered.…”

“…The use of sources underpins the role of media relations professional. The role of sources has often been regarded as the key influencer (Carlson, 2009;Sherwood, Nicholson & Marjoribanks, 2016;Wilson & Ibrahim, 2018). These sources have influential power to affect the media agenda, and one of the main strategies that public relations practitioners use to do that is to provide information subsidies (Sherwood et al, 2016).…”

“…Reporters try to write "stories," and it is hard to tell a good story without knowing all the facts-or, perhaps suspecting what the facts are, but not being free to state them as such because of libel laws, invasion of privacy laws, or the reluctance of the police to go on the record. Thus, in the limited time of the publication cycle, journalists do the best they can to tell what they know in an engaging and accurate way (Wilson & Ibrahim, 2018). But this is very difficult.…”

Media Strategy in Covering Religious Conflicts: A Case Study of Ahmadiyah Conflict in West Java, Indonesia

“…Furthermore, in covering conflict, journalists have to maintain their objectivity and professionalism (Vandevoordt, 2015) including professionalism in using language in crafting news based on accurate data. Language capacity is very important as mass media can use language (word choice) in creating harmony (Wibowo, 2018 Galtung and other experts agreed that in covering conflict, media must be able to reduce and resolve the conflict (Galtung in Lynch & McGoldrick, 2005;Wilson & Ibrahim, 2018). In order to do so, for instance, editors and journalists can be trained to use appropriate media language and serve as peace communicators.…”