Pro-Taib copycat website vanishes from cyberspace

A website seemingly set up to counter negative reports against Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud has shut down.

Sarawak Reports, which went online in the lead up to the Sarawak state election to counter reports by a whistleblower website with an almost identical name Sarawak Report can no longer be found on cyberspace.

In an Oct 13 posting celebrating the demise of its nemesis, the real Sarawak Report said this was a "humiliating defeat" for the chief minister's US$5 million (RM16 million) per year 'Cyber War Campaign'.

According to the Sarawak Report, its doppelganger was part of a "vicious network of internet sites set up by the crooked UK-based FBC media" to undermine the exposes involving Abdul Taib.

"By adopting a virtually identical name to our own, FBC clearly hoped they could confuse web-surfers into reading their pro-Taib propaganda, instead of our research into Taib's 30 years of corrupt government," the website noted.

Besides promoting the chief minister and his policies, the imitation website also consistently attacked Sarawak Report editor Clare Rewcastle Brown and her family members.

Truth will always out

Sarawak Report backed their claim of the existence of the malicious cyber campaign by pointing to the state's Supplementary Budget 2010 Bill.

An RM28.35 million entry in Sarawak's Supplementary Budget 2010 Bill showed that FBC was allocated RM28.35 million for work on a 'Global Strategic Communications Campaign' ordered in 2009.

The company had received RM29.34 million the previous year.

The chief minister had refused to comment when approached on the matter by Malaysiakini after a BN leaders' meeting in August.

Earlier this week, the prime minister had in a written answer in Parliament said that the government had paid FBC 19.6 euros (RM83.8 million) for three years since 2007 to spruce up Malaysia's image globally.

The annual contract, terminated in 2010, was for "the production and broadcast of programmes on Malaysia in the international media was part of our efforts to improve Malaysia's profile internationally, as stipulated in the contract with FBC Media".

FBC's practices are currently being investigated by a UK regulatory authority.

The company has been accused of producing editorial content on foreign subjects to international broadcasters while at the same time doing public relations work for the same government it was reporting on.

Broadcasters CNBC, BBC and US magazine the Atlantic have all launched internal investigations into the connections with FBC.