Monday, October 20, 2008

Who says NST's "an old rag"?

Another revamp, with or without the god and his angel. The Board of NSTP meets today and one of the things it will discuss is the resignation of Kalimullah Masheerul Hassan and the expiring contract of Group Editor-in-chief Hishamuddin Aun.
I'm not sure if the Board knows about "an exhaustive revamp" of the NST due to roll out in January 2009 (pls ignore the little mistake about the year in the memo above). Meetings on the revamp are due to start next month.
It seems that the young jounalists at the NST view their paper like an old rag.


Anonymous said...

Can anyone really decide on Kali's fate other than the Imam Hadhari? I tau dia sudah but 'line' dengan Najib. Dia mesti survive punya. Dia banyak wang dan banyak pengaruh. Dia untouchable lah mister...! untouchable tu banyuak makna tau...

kuey teow

Anonymous Liew said...

yup...still remember my years as a school librarian..
students hunt for TheStar...
while the teachers hang on to the NST..

Anonymous said...

I have been reading the New Straits Times since the 60's and still do so despite the sometimes 'pro government' agenda.

The good old days have definitely gone but still, it carries the basic daily news. The good things about this paper is the lack of advertisements and not so thick with junk news.

I wilol still be a loyal reader with or without revamps.

However, I have given up reading the Malay Mail more than ten years ago.

The Malay Mail was once a 'must read' paper during lunch hour at the office but not any longer.

If at all any revamp is to be made, then please win me over with a complete overhaul of the Malay Mail.

Just do what it did in the 70's..... controversial news. I am sure there will still be new readers, as the problems of yesterday is still the same today.


Anonymous said...

Let's not be too keen to criticise others. We must remember that we too are not without sins
Let he who is not a sinner cast the first stone

Edmund Wong

apanama said...

Bro, the guy who signed the 'Revamp' memo must be the among the first to make way for a real Revamp.
How could the NST still keep boneless-chickens and spineless suckers like him?
He is one of Mullah's main 'toyboy' who performs just exactly as his master instructs him.
He cant even go to Malaysian Insider bcoz he doesnt understand whats happening around him.
NST reporters would vouch that he doesnt know what transpires outside his cubicle, what more the day to day affairs in the nation.
He just takes instructions and assigns others to write ... I think a retired Jabatan Penerangan office-boy could perform better than dat guy Kamarul.

Anonymous said...

Except for Syed Nazri, the rest should start packing their bags ...if indeed the NST is to be reavmped.

the Rest = Hishamaun-lionel-Manja Smail-calvin-leeaachai-kamrul-...and the socalled Group Photo Editor Kamruddin (who behaves like NSTP groud editor in-chief)

(Kalhua lover)

nstman said...

How many times must they revamp? They started revamping when circulation hit the skids in the late nineties. Each revamp was followed by a further drop in circulation. By now even an idiot will realise that another revamp is doomed to fail. Anecdotal evidence has shown this fallacious idea should be a no-no. My message to stupid, motherduckers, mutts in the NST is very simple - improve your contents and stop being a mouthpiece of Umno, the most hated party in the country. And make Rocky the generalissmo of the paper, free of political interference. Let Rocky do what is necessary to resurrect a dying paper. This is NST's last chance saloon. Sack Hishamuddin Ann (or better still make him a chief office boy) and Syed Nadzri and their ilk. Start all over again.

balan said...

I grew up with NST. They still have the widest reach as compared to other English Daily. You can find them in felda's and rural area's still but not widely read in the cities, especially Penang and now KL.

While it may be used as avenue for PR by Pah Lah and Kali, I still find their language and article reasonably good. You dont get that in the star or sun.

NST is an institution and perhaps a national heritage, wronged by various politicians over the years

By the way, they have sold Malay Mail. I have been reading it, they are making a comeback of sorts but nothing really interesting except for maybe Amir Muhammad and Parliaments reports.


nstman (nst whore) said...

Anger has prompted me to revisit this blog. For the last time I urge NST to hire Rocky. This is the only way for you bastards. NST has been raped, gang-raped, butchered, mugged, buggered and sodomised for so long that it has lost its sense of purpose. The only blueprint for NST is not revamp, it is common sense. And common sense dictates that everything has failed except to bring the saviour back. And the saviour is Rocky.

Anonymous said...

Rocky, please check NST and BH circulation figures at the moment. We were told yhat BH has gone down below 150,000 copies a day and NST below 100,000 a day. They have faided. Cakap berdegar-degar dan belagak...ex-gratia jadi history of nstp.

Pisang Nangka


revamp lagi?

Anonymous said...

dato kali

remove saja all the deadwood and correspondent in the States like Kedah and terengganu. they are making the papers look like old rag.

Anonymous said...

Make Hishammuddin Aun the CEO. Chief Engine Operator

Anonymous said...


Malay Mail was a shit and still is.

They got the wrong editors to run the paper and the Malay Mail is dying up a bloody death

Abu Seman said...

By the way...

I must admire your news nose. Havent lost it all these years huh?

NST doesnt need a revamp. They only need to boot out the moles. The company is leaking like bottomless teacup and if a memo like this gets out to you, god knows what else has leaked to the rival papers?

Anonymous said...

NSTman, you are so pathetic. This was what another blogger dubbed not long ago for talking coke. You are a disgrace...

Anonymous said...

nstman, do you think you believe what you are writing? Or are you trying to catch a fish?

Anonymous said...

Everyone seems to to forget that to sell the newspaper, an efficient and effective sales & marketing dept in needed. Currently, NSTP has a circulation dept with a mobile phone salesman & medicine man heading the dept that only circulates the newspaper. New sales & maketing strategies is needed to compete with Star & the Sun. With good people NSTP should have at least secured its readers, it is now losing readers everyday.

Anonymous said...

exec-editor nst ahchai is yet to write a single news report, analysis, commentary or anything read-able since his appointment. So why is the shorty still there bro, housekeeper, executive editor, EPL bookie or pookie?

lionL more-rice

Anonymous said...


Anonymous said...

Hi Rocky, NST is "an old rag" okay since many years ago but made worse by the Kali-Brendan-Hisham Aun regime. Kali is a master spinner; Brendan was a plagiarist, and Hishamuddin is an apple polisher extraordinaire.
Brendan got Png Hong Kwang and Chandra Segar to copycat and plagiarise The Independent tabloid and now Hisham also got BH to join them. These are the very same people who screwed the Malay Mail big time!
Call the paper whatever they want, NSTP is already fcuk up by Kalimullah Maseerul Hassan and his goons...

1. Syed Feisal Albar
2. Hardev Kaur
3. Rose Ismail
4. Sallehuddin Osman
5. Brendan Perera
6. Syed Nadzri
7. Png Hong Kwang
8. Chandra Segar
9. Kamrul Idris
10. Lionel Morais


Anonymous said...

If you have people like Kamrul, Chandra and Lionel Morais running the paper, what do u get?

Answer is OLD RAG

You included, Kamrul

Anonymous said...


Hisham sekarang nak ubah angin. Semalam kata Najib OK dengan dia dan mahu dia kekal di NSTP.

Tiga hari lepas cakap lain. Tiga hari lepas dia buat stetment GEIC baru akan dipilih oleh Rosmah.

Dasar lalang dan mulut celupar

Anonymous said...

Bro Rocky

Seperti biasa Kali akan revamp editorial line up dan promote talibarut dia dalam NST supaya bila orang baru masuk dah tidak dapat buat apa-apa.

Syed Nazri tunggul kayu buat buat tak kisah saja.

donplaypuks® said...

Guess Fox will get the contract for this re-hash and PR spin-doctoring to handle the 'crisis.'

But there is that old saying that 'you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ears' and the New State Parsely Sage Rosemary Thighyme Dishrag will continue to bleed.

It's biz section cannot hold a candle to the Star's while the layout of the other sections is so confusing you want to burn it.

But the real problem is that it is seen as the grovelling mouthpiece of the ruling Govt and so many will stay far from it even if offered free copies. And with friends like Buntutsan, who needs enemies?

Stay true to objective reporting and the tide may turn. Or is it past the point of redemption already?

Fern said...

Anon 6.31,

Malay Mail is doing better than compared to when it was with NST.

And how can those who "haven't read the paper in ten years" complain about the content, since you would not know what's in it?

My prediction: Rocky's gonna make a comeback, but not in NST - he'll helm Malay Mail

Anonymous said...


I have been working at nst for several years, and i'd like to think that everything would be okay after the revamp...but i know that its easier said than done.

is revamp a panacea for nst? yes, if the revamp includes soul-searching and really facing what's really ailing nst. methinks its the coverage of the 2008 election and the permatang pauh election that caused the massive readership loss to nst recently, prompting the top-guns to do another revamp.

what will 2009 be for nst, then? i don't know, but i hope it's not a death knell for nst by then. or i'll be forced to ship out.


Anonymous said...

Dey! Abu Seman, it is an open secret in NST/NSTP that everything inside and outside the building, including your promotion, must be told and decided by Brendan Pereira of Malaysian Insider/Fox Media.
Umno kicked out Brendan but for Kalimullah Hassan, Umno can go to hell! Brendan gives out instructions to his subordinates Kamrul Idris, Lionel Morais, Chandra 'Master Conspirator' Segar, Lee ah Chai and other Hindraf members.
So Dey! Abu Seman, what leaks are you talking about daa. That's considered nothing la bro.
The country's secret and security matters are also being leaked Brendan who will pass on these information to his Red Dot spy network la.
If Umno and the Government doesn't care about all this, what the eff... la Abu Seman!!!


pro bono publico said...


Agreed! The biz section is a goner. Lost to the Edge long time ago, let alone the Star's. As for layouts, good observations donplaypuks

Anonymous said...

most of the so-called journalists in the newspaper have actually be conditioned as lifestyle reporters.
they are often spared real serious work as only feel good pieces made it to the pages.
politics and serious social issues are handled only by a few 'elites' who could hardly spell politics.
with all due respect can someone imagine a half-baked crime reporter transforming into a chief editor overnight.
politics for him is 'kali-punya' or 'brrandan-punya'.
he just emails the main/sensitive political stories to the 'masters' and push them for printing when the mail returns.
return such pretenders to where they belong or set up a crime-pullout for distribution in all our detention centres.
In the meantime the EPL bookie is running real fast, trying to complete his last lap.
ManU vs Liverpool sapa minang la ma'cha? He must be an ARSE oops Arsenal supporter.

goodluck nst

p/s wish Kadir Jasin could be brought back for some discpline & some real newspaper content.

Ex-NST ... who is still in love with the broadsheet.

Anonymous said...

It is an old rag!
It could not even get a memo dates correctly!
What more do we need to say?


Anonymous said...

Thankfully, I could read the NST revamp memo posted on your blog. The "exhaustive revamp" sounds like a pipe dream from the person who wrote it. And from what I have gathered, has no known experience in this matter except that he's just a writer.

Re-point No 2: Calling on section heads to start "delivering" with evaluation reports and proposals is like calling on known deadwoods to wake up and come out with brilliant ideas. If they had any in the first place, they would have taken the initiative and done that long ago. It's like flogging a dead horse.

Re-point No 4: The suggestion to "consult" subordinates for so-called young ideas is again like flogging a dead horse. From the information I got, most of them are still on the learning curve and trying to get to grips with their own journalistic skills. Again, it is like saying that the editorial leadership itself is lacking in ideas on how to improve the paper.

It would be interesting to see the questionaires that will be distributed among the staff. If you can get hold of the questionaires and post it on this blog, I'll be glad to answer them.

Political constraints aside, the NST is suffering from a lack of vision and direction in general editorial content. Peter's Principle is very much in play here when you look at the appointments of section heads.

Singapore Lion

Anonymous said...

I think if we can gather all the commenters here and ask them to run the NST, the old rag will be far better than even the NYT or even USA Today. But alas...cakap is of course easy. Arm chair critics will of course never be wrong. Pergi kasi terbang itu layang layang la lagi baik.


Anonymous said...

you all forget one important thing.

Kali is losing sleep wondering he leaked the memo.

so expect someone to be made a scapegoat like being transferred or sacked.

Anonymous said...

The situation in NST is a small matter and can be overcome overnight. Problem with NST staff was that they never learned from Brendan.

Brendan had left a legacy, changing the style of writing and hammering the spirit of self confidence in the staff.

One marked contribution that Brendan left was the style and quality in writing stories.

NST under Brendan and Kalimullah were back to its glory days. If you don't believe me, ask Syed Feisal.

To the staff of NST, please learn from Brendan. Even Mitch Albom has some nice words to say about Brendan's work.

The most respectable and supern story written by Brendan during his days at NST was this:

How dearly we miss June 6


WE never saw June 7 coming. Sure, there were whispers that he was not happy with the way his successor was running the country; with the way ministers and business friends were not returning calls.

But no one saw June 7 coming. That was the day Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad accused the PM of stabbing him in the back; of reversing his policies; of canceling projects, including the half-bridge to Singapore. He attacked with the ferocity of a street fighter and suggested that Abdullah was the second choice for the top job in the country.

He wanted to know why Tengku Mahaleel Tengku Ariff was no longer running Proton, why development in Putrajaya had slowed down. He wanted to know why the person he left in charge of the country was no longer dancing to his tune.

Looking back, that was the day when he crossed the line. History records these watershed events because they change the mood of the country, pit kin against kin and dominate the landscape.

If June 7 is the day we never saw coming, June 6 is the day we will not never see again for a while. And how we miss it.

We miss going to lunches or dinners and just shooting the breeze, instead of spending hours dissecting the latest tirade and figuring out why power is so hard to let go.

We miss those days when people didn’t make you feel that you’re one of us or you’re one of them.

We miss the time when half-past six was used in a moment of levity between childhood friends.

We miss the time when exclusive interviews about Malaysia on CNN, BBC, CNBC or Bloomberg were about the country and its prospects, not about political sideshow.

We miss when a can of aerosol can was not considered a weapon.

We miss the days we watched leaders in other countries slug it out in public and said: At least our leaders don’t do that.

We miss when we didn’t war among ourselves over a war being waged by an individual.

We miss when we spoke to a friend and didn’t hear a voice in our heads heads whispering, I wonder whose side they’d be on?

We miss when peace talks referred to discussions between the Tamil Tigers and the Sri Lanka government or between the warring factions in Palestine.

We miss the feeling when there wasn’t a cloud hanging over the political landscape, and a feeling that no words or explanations can be a balm to this festering sore.

We miss the days when the mention of Dr Mahathir’s name unleashed a vision of a leader handing over power at the peak of his powers, not a mental picture of someone seeking to bring down someone in power.

We miss the days when the prime minister had to defend his policies, not parry personal attacks.

We miss when a volley referred to a sweet left foot strike by Wayne Rooney, not a barb fired across the bow by the former PM against his perceived enemies.

We miss when we spoke of a legacy in glowing terms not with a sense of doom.

We miss when the world looked at us with pride and wondered why other young countries could not have a smooth change of guard.

We miss when Dr Mahathir spoke like a statesman.

We miss the time when we did not have to rake up our dark past and remember stories of former prime ministers taking on incumbents. Tunku Abdul Rahman and Tun Hussein Onn deserve their rest and place in history.

We miss the days when the battle lines were clear — government versus opposition. Yes, we miss June 6.

Anonymous said...

Hishammuddin akan kekal di BH. Katanya dia ada link dengan Najib. Baru baru ini dia minta nak jumpa Muhyiddin. Muhyiddin kata tunggu dulu.

Muhyiddin pun tahu berita mengenai dia kena boikot. Baru dua tiga hari ini baru Hisham suruh pakai balik.

Anonymous said...

Hisham will survive. He has a lot of money.

Anonymous said...

Aku setuju Kamaruddin foto kena tendang.

Bukan main hebat dia masa Hisham jadi GEIC.

Dia yang cadang siapa yang patut kena tendang.

Kamaruddin, tunggulah masa engkau pula kena tendang

Anonymous said...

We are waiting for the first analysis from Ah Chai. We have seen rookie reporters writing analysis.

Let's wait for Ah Chai's first analysis and let's pray it will come before doomsday.

Anonymous said...

Don't run down Ah Chai la. He is a trusted bookie. Without him, who is going to handle the bets for next year world cup

Anonymous said...


Jangan lupa buat birthday parti kat KTV untuk Manja sekali lagi. Dua bakal GEIC tu.

Anonymous said...

The pending revamp of NST (if it ever takes off) will be a futile exercise because a new regime will take over soon next year led by you-know-who.

Everything will be dismantled. And then there will be another revamp. And everyone of you bloggers who like to sneer at any NST revamp will start using the same old cliche. What, another one?

It looks like the NST will never cast off its circus image. It's like a bunch of circus clowns being purged and another gang of circus clowns will come in to continue the circus. A never-ending story. A sad one, indeed. Not really a laughing matter.

Russian circus clown

Conrad said...

Come on la Rocky ... everyone knows ur making a come back with Ahmad Talib, so dont fuck around and talk about revamp. I am sure you are just waiting la bro.... Its pay back time right ... I am waiting for you take over then we the bloggers will fuck you up, because you are just like kali, brendan and the rest ... ... so i say to you close this blog down and start hiring people who will be with you till you survive in NST ... dont forget bro, what goes around comes around...


Anonymous said...

Berape kali nak revamp paper ni? kita orang dah pening dah. cukup lah revamp revamp ni. tolong lah.

sarah palin

Anonymous said...


Let's wait for Ah Chai's first analysis and let's pray it will come before doomsday."

and he's also telling everyone in the newsroom to jump on the new media bandwagon to boost the NST like doing podcasting and blogging.

Little Sparrow

Anonymous said...

Both the medicinemen in Circulation Dept are not doing their job. The absence of sales and marketing strategies will definitely create failure for NST to compete with other English papers.

The next new management should be innovative enough and the two medicinemen must be fired without condition. OLD FRIEND.